Bandung: When little Lanka stood up to Big Brother

At a conference in Bandung, Indonesia, Prime Ministers and bigwigs of several countries in the East met to confer on regional issues, in 1955 when Sir John Kotalawala was Prime Minister of Ceylon. When his turn came he had made a devastating and highly controversial speech in his characteristic style which had piqued a few heads.

After that performance, Pandit Nehru, Prime Minister of India, had asked Sir John, "Why did you not show me that speech before you made it?" Pat came the reply, "I say Nehru, do you show me your speeches before you make them?" That gem was worth a thousand 'China shops'.

The intellectual and cultured Pandit Nehru had been stopped in his tracks by that instant and curt response of a not so intellectual and cultured Sir John. India's assumption of a Big Brother role, considering Ceylon a vassal of India, received a stinging rebuke. Hence the Hero of Bandung.

Now, 51 years later (after Bandung) the germ is puffing out into a 'super power' of the region by recent provocative utterances of lesser, arrogant dreamers.

By R. A. Goonewardene, Moratuwa