It is with a sense of deep sadness that I write about the late P.P.P. Jinadasa, better known as PPP, but as Piya to his family and friends.
For someone who associated closely with PPP for as long as I did –from kindergarten to the present, to be precise – writing a book about him would be no big deal. But as this is not the place for a full biography, I shall confine myself to a short epitaph as tribute.
PPP needs no monument. The memory of his exemplary life, which time can never efface, is his monument. His name and the goodness that filled his life, like the stars in the firmament, can never be dimmed.
After my retirement, I had the pleasure of functioning as sales manager in his company, and thus became aware of the unique way he used his wealth and wisdom for the advancement of others. PPP’s relatives and friends were not the only beneficiaries of his largesse.
I remember how he advised me to allow my children to develop their talents. He would tell me how he started life with a hammer and a screwdriver in his hands. Sensing my children’s natural abilities, he advised me to instal a workshop for them, and said he would help them get on in life. This was only one of many such instances of his generosity. Up-and-coming children, he treated like his own. I have yet to see anyone who gave as much as PPP did, from the largeness of his heart, to help others in their personal development, often unasked. Their progress in life was his personal concern.
This is a quality he inherited from his parents, especially his mother. I remember how she would generously feed us whenever we children dropped in at PPP’s parents’ home in Meddawatta, Matara, for a fresh water well bath. PPP’s quality of benevolence deepened and expanded when in later years he joined the Lions Movement.
A pioneer in the manufacture of tea machinery, PPP achieved a high status in the country as an industrialist. Backed by Japanese technology, he was outstanding in this field. He demise leaves a great void among his countless friends, relatives and fellow workers. But there is comfort in the thought that he lived a righteous life and qualified for the higher realms of Samsara.
He also leaves behind two independent sons, a talented daughter, and a wife whose culture and dauntless courage will help extend PPP’s virtues and the ideals he lived for into the future.
I have lost a true friend.
May he attain Nibbana.
Sugi Mutucumarana
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