5th Column

My Dear Sarath,
I thought I must write to you to clarify certain statements that you have been making from time to time. That is because some people say that you have become just another politician, while others say that with advancing years, you seem to be losing your marbles! I will try and explain why.

It is always nice to see you back in the limelight, silver hair and all, because you never fail to say something that gets talked about. And that is why, seeing you after sometime, you got tongues wagging again with your comments which seemed to have confused, but not surprised, many people.

Of course, Sarath, controversy is nothing new to you. Ever since you reached the higher rungs of the legal ladder, people were whispering about your political affiliations.

Satellite appointed you as the boss of the big judges. She had cleverly got around the fact that you were junior on the big bench by appointing you as the chief legal officer first. So, she could argue that she was honouring the tradition of appointing the chief legal officer as the boss of the big judges.

So, many saw you as Satellite’s blue eyed boy and believed that you would back her to the hilt. After all, rumour has it that she even dissolved Parliament to help you to keep your job when the Greens who were then holding the reins of government tried to impeach you.

That was also when you tried SB for contempt of court because he called the judgments of your court a ‘balu theenduwa’. He had to spend two years in prison, but lo and behold, the great survivor that he is, he is still around and is now making noises in support of Maithri against Mahinda maama!

What everyone had however forgotten was that you were also Mahinda maama’s good friend. A few years later, Mahinda maama’s star was rising and he wanted to contest the elections early before his luck ran out. That was when you were called upon to decide when Satellite’s term of office ended.

I am sure you would argue that you cast previous loyalties aside and decided on the merits of the law. Whatever it was, Satellite had to retire a year earlier than she expected. That was when we first thought that you were letting your friendship with Mahinda maama colour your judgment.

Not only did you decide that Satellite should leave office, you also paved the way for Mahinda maama to run the race without a handicap by clearing him of charges in the ‘Helping Hambantota’ case. Not content, you asked the person who made that complaint, Kabir, to pay compensation too!

You gave judgments with serious consequences on issues such as school admissions, hedging deals and petrol prices. You declared that Mahinda maama’s right hand man at the Treasury should never be employed by the government. It was as if you, and not Mahinda maama, were running the country!

At the same time, you did not forget to reward your old friend Satellite with a judgment of her own, ordering her to pay three million rupees because of what she did at Waters’ Edge. After that, it seems as if you made a habit of becoming hostile to the leaders who appointed you.

By the time Mahinda maama ran for re-election just after the war victory, you had retired and Shirani was doing your job but you found a way back in to the limelight: you were tongue lashing Mahinda maama whenever you could. Some were even debating which ‘Sarath’ should be running against him.

It was not you, but the ‘other’ Sarath who won the war who took up that challenge and he fully recovered only recently from that. You might consider yourself quite lucky about that too because had you run against Mahinda maama, who knows what skeletons he might have unearthed against you!

We next heard from you when Mahinda maama announced his intentions of running for a third time. You were quick to condemn that and pledge your support to Maithri. You even asked for forgiveness from the nation for not ending Mahinda maama’s career with the ‘Helping Hambantota’ case!

If we thought this was the last we heard from you, we know now that we are mistaken. Last week we saw you back with Mahinda maama, telling us what a great leader he was and how you were sad that a ‘prince’ was in prison. You also told us that ‘yahapaalanaya’ was dead. Ah, surprise, surprise!

All this is pretty confusing for us. We are used to SB telling us different stories about different leaders at different times. We are also used to Rauff or Thonda taking the side of whoever that wins. So, spare us the agony, and the next time you have an opinion, keep it to yourself, will you, Sarath?

Yours sincerely,
Punchi Putha
PS- There was a time when people blamed JR for all the ills that have plagued our country in recent times. Do you know that now, instead of blaming JR, they blame you for the various verdicts you gave, including the one which allowed MPs to switch sides. I suppose history will decide who the greater culprit is!