Breaking boundaries
Shyamalie Perera: Sitting in the high chair of the Surveyor-General, with the portraits of many of the 49 men before her adorning the wall to her left. Pic by Priyantha Wickramaarachchi
Was it meant to be? A Thaththa’s dream that propelled her towards a demanding and challenging career, where only few women dared to go, that has finally paid dividends.
It was, however, never her ambition to reach the top. She did whatever duty entrusted to her in her line of work with commitment.
“I think Thaththa wanted me to join the Survey Department because I was studious,” smiles the first woman to sit in the high chair of the Surveyor-General, Shyamalie Perera, with the portraits of many of the 49 men before her adorning the wall to her left.
The 220-year-old Survey Department is the oldest government department in the country established on August 2, 1800 with just five surveyors, changing with the times to branch out into Land Surveying, Mapping, Satellite Remote Sensing (RS), Global Positioning System (GPS), Geographical Information System (GIS), Land Information Systems (LIS), Airborne Remote Sensing and Photogrammetric activities and latterly Geo Names (Geographical names) and National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI).
We meet Shyamalie on Wednesday (February 26), the day she has taken up her appointment, as bouquets of roses, orchids and more fill her office, staff queue to offer congratulations and every few minutes her mobile rings with best wishes. We have walked one flight of steps to her office in the sprawling grounds of the department at 150, Kirula Road, Colombo 5, where the entrance is adorned by a huge map of Sri Lanka with thin crisscrossing networks of lines.
As she talks of her life, it is obvious that she has been the exception to the rule on many occasions along the way.
Home was in Bandaragama with both parents being teachers and her early education at Good Shepherd Convent, Panadura. A double-promotion student, Shyamalie had sat the scholarship examination in Grade 7, which sent her straight to Devi Balika Vidyalaya in Colombo.
Her father accompanied her to school far away from home only on the first day to show her the way and she recalls how she would get on a Pettah bus at 4.30 a.m. and keep a close watch for the landmark that was Albert Edirisinghe Opticians at Bambalapitiya where she would quickly de-bus to take the next – No. 154 – to Devi Balika where she achieved much under the guidance of Principal Kalyani de Zoysa.
“Ekale kanatte issarahin yanna bayai,” she laughs, reliving the moments of terror when she had to pass-by the General Cemetery, Kanatte.
Mathematics was Shyamalie’s strong subject, with only six girls, taking to this stream at the Advanced Level. Missing engineering by a whisker, she headed to the University of Peradeniya to read for a Degree in Physical Sciences (a batch comprising of 145 with very few women) setting her mind on double math and physics, topping the batch in 1983 and walking away with the Coomaraswamy Memorial Prize.
Shyamalie’s first job was as a temporary Assistant Lecturer in the Mathematics Department of the Peradeniya University and later as a Scientific Officer at the Atomic Energy Authority in Colombo which she stomached only for three months, as “it was not suitable and entailed only administrative work and writing letters”, going back to Peradeniya when Prof. G.A. Dissanayaka offered her a post as a demonstrator while she studied for her Special Degree.
Her pathway seemed to be set, for while she was in university earlier too in her second year, her Thaththa had wanted her to join the Survey Department as it was only the “cream” that was absorbed into this prestigious institution. But she had desisted.
In 1985, Shyamalie applied to the department on the urgings of her father and when she secured a job as an Assistant Survey Superintendent he had sent her Malli with the appointment letter which had been received at home along with another letter clearly laying out the advantages and disadvantages, arguing heavily for the job, while her Amma told her: “Kemathi deyak karanna.” (Do what you like.)
Caught in a difficult situation of choices, she turned to her Professor who had immediately said “it’s a good job” and she had taken up the post on March 1, 1985.
There started an “amuthu jeevithayak” for Shyamalie, in a predominantly male bastion, with only one woman going before her……a three-year training at the Institute of Surveying & Mapping (ISM) at Diyatalawa to secure a Higher Diploma in Surveying, being the only woman in a batch of 22.
“Fortunately for me there was one Assistant Survey Superintendent who was a female, Roshini Gunasekera, who was smart and had a fantastic personality who took me under her wing. She was in the third year when I was in my first,” says Shyamalie, describing how the considerate Survey Superintendent Mr. Ariyaratne accorded adjoining twin houses to the two women.
The second year was field training and for Shyamalie it was Elapatha in Ratnapura where the difficult terrain honed her skills of land surveying in remote villages, crossing winding rivers. Her Thaththa found lodgings for her in a village home but life was tough for there was no water even to drink making her wonder whether it was “a pavak or pinak”. Once again her superior officer was Roshini who helped boost her morale.
Shyamalie gives a glimpse of those times – a ‘gang’ of field staff lugging all the instruments, the theodolite, pole and tripod, being followed by a slip of a lass, just 24 years old, with a bag slung over her shoulder labouring up hilly terrain.
In the third year back at the ISM, she sailed through the examinations with a class, subsequently being assigned to Neluwa, another remote area off Galle, for her first posting.
Memories flood back – troubled times, for the country was in the throes of the second insurgency of 1988-89 and for Shyamalie getting to work taking several days with no public transport. Oft she would hitch a bumpy ride in a lorry.
Next it was a stint at the ISM and later at the Centre for Remote Sensing at Head Office where a Sri Lanka-Swiss Remote Sensing Project was being implemented under which land-use maps were prepared utilizing satellite images and aerial photographs.
The course of her life had taken off thereafter – personal fulfilment coming from marrying a batch-mate in the group of 22 which joined the ISM and the couple heading to the Netherlands in 1991-92, Shyamalie for her Master’s in Integrated Map Geo Information Production and her husband on a UNDP scholarship.
Returning to Sri Lanka, both had been assigned to the ISM as lecturers, but later she had been given a special assignment at the Centre for Remote Sensing in June 1993; followed by a transfer in 1999 to the Kalutara District Survey Office; being summoned back by the then Surveyor-General Ranasinghe Silva to sit for the Diploma in Public Administration of the prestigious Sri Lanka Administrative Service (SLAS), after which she worked for him as his Personal Assistant; taking up the Procurement Branch; getting back to the GIS Branch; and assuming the post of Deputy Surveyor-General in 2007.
From 2007-2010, it had fallen on her slender shoulders to handle the Bim Saviya Project and it is with justifiable pride that she says “maximum progress” was made during that time, while from 2011-2017 she managed Digital Data Handling at the Land Information Systems Branch which covered all digital survey data.
“My strength is that I am technically sound,” she says with humility, adding that she was a pioneer in the arena of GIS technology.
Even though a truly successful career woman, she has never neglected her home-front at Kohuwela but does all the chores without domestic help. She is quick to appreciate the “immense” support she gets from husband, Parakum Shantha, who knows her work in and out as he too is in the department, and two sons, Kaushik Shamantha, a software engineer and Tharusha Madushan, a medical student.
“Many may have realized my potential and that I would rise to be the Surveyor-General, but I never aspired to that post. I just tried to achieve perfection in whatever I did,” says Shyamalie calling herself very much a team player.
She is well-known for being firm but kind and the work ethic of “puluwannam karanna, nethnam yanna” with warnings being issued if “boru karoth”.
Realizing the immense responsibility bestowed on her, she says there are lots of expectations from her as well as big challenges she will face.
This is why Shyamalie in her address delivered with mathematical precision to her staff promised them that she will work towards restoring professional discipline to what it was when she first joined the service; ensuring that the rest of the staff is happy by looking into their needs such as promotions, pay rises, filling vacancies, etc; increasing the quality as well as the quantity of surveying; and making sure that all extant maps are available to the public on the internet.
As she takes the seat of the Surveyor-General, there is a tinge of sadness – her Amma (93) is around to pat her on the back but her Thaththa who was convinced that she would achieve greatness is no more. He had died in September just last year.
In the pursuit of excellence for her august department Shyamalie seeks an assurance from us – like this interview, “let’s look back on what I have achieved when I retire,” she says.