Letters to the Editor

20th February 2000

• Openness needed before condemning chuckers
• Bring down the price of gas
• Falling under increasing burdens
• Forgotten heroes
• Give all teachers a fair chance
• Wanted: a home for Kandy's strays

Openness needed before condemning chuckers

Most people are aware that the no-ball rule on throwing the ball is defective. It is one of the few laws where mere suspicion deems one guilty. The rule is under review now - but, alas, at ICC pace. So what does one do in the interim?

Where a rule is seriously flawed it is imperative for umpires and those in powerful positions to administer it leniently and with common sense. But what do we see? We see a body of puritans who wish to clean the Augean stables using the new slow-motion technology to cleanse the world of chuckers. One of these voices was displayed quite adamantly on the ABC's 7.30 report on Tuesday, January 4, as effectively, a radio commentator called Bharadwaj's action into question.

These voices think they are doing the game of cricket a service. Their intentions are good. But their effects are as disastrous as the work of the witch-hunters at Salem way back in time. As Jeff Thomson has stated publicly, if one was to focus on the occasional odd-action among bowlers in this manner, a significant number of bowlers would be called.

One of the problems is that these actions are being pursued by a body of persons who remain mostly faceless and unaccountable. Justice must be public, egalitarian and standardised. But who has collected the video evidence in the cases sent to the ICC thus far? And as it happens who are the accused? To build up defences by referring to "persecution mania" in the Indian subcontinent misses the point. What is the "evidence" provided by the answers to my two questions.

It is about time that the ICC set up an accredited body to collect evidence against alleged chuckers and rendered the procedure open. And where the ICC Committee reaches decisions by telephone meetings, such procedures call for "due process". Where individual careers are threatened in such a traumatic manner, it is not only incumbent upon the 'court of justice' to meet expeditiously (and that was not the case with Shoaib Akhtar), but it is also vital that the decision should not be taken in "one sitting". A second "sitting" is required after members have had time to reflect on their initial learnings and to review the video evidence again in the light of their first 'conference.' Hasty decisions must be avoided in circumstances where the adjudicators are not meeting face to face with the evidence displayed in front of them so to speak. After all, we are talking here of frame by frame analysis.

Michael Roberts
Adelaide.

Bring down the price of gas

The use of gas for cooking purposes is not a luxury any more.

All the people who live in flats are compelled to use gas as the use of firewood in flats is prohibited.

I understand a majority of them fall within the category of the middle class or below.

If the Government has indeed given the green light to Shell Co. which supplies gas to Sri Lanka to increase the price it is tantamount to putting the masses into a more difficult position when they are already struggling to make ends meet due to the high cost of living.

At the start the Shell Co. sold a cylinder of gas at Rs. 330/- increased recently to Rs. 345/- and now again increased to Rs. 375/-.

I happened to read a news item some time ago to the effect that a Singapore firm was prepared to supply a cylinder at Rs. 265/-.

If that is correct, I wonder why the Government has given a contract to the Shell Co. to throttle the masses in this manner.

Cannot the government. even now intervene and do something to bring down the price of gas and relieve, even to some extent, the suffering of the masses?

A. D. Jayaweera
Bentota

Falling under increasing burdens

Walking down Duplication Road recently I saw an old woman fallen on the road. I helped her on to her feet and asked her it happened. She said her slipper had got entangled in a broken slab of cement on the pavement. It said a great deal for the sad state of our country.

Like that poor old woman, it is the poor who are at the butt-end of all the afflictions that people are subject to these days. The cost of essentials have gone up and so have bus fares and to top it all the poor have not even the freedom to walk in safety. Big buildings have zoomed up on all sides of nearly every road in the city and the owners have sectioned off the pavements opposite them with railings to park cars and motorcycles. The poor pedestrians have to walk on the roads as they cannot use the pavements, and risk being run over by speeding traffic.

The rich drive in intercoolers and posh cars - all air-conditioned. Among them are the contractors who make money and supply the inferior cement with which the pavement slabs are made. No wonder that poor woman fell. As for me I keep my eyes glued to the ground when walking these payments. The government is not going to pay my hospital bills if I am injured after a fall.

That much I know. Sri Lanka is going from bad to worse and let us hope our nation does not have a bad fall!

C. R. Amarasekera
Colombo 3.

Forgotten heroes

It's a pity that amidst the plethora of information in the media regarding Sri Lanka's 52 years of Independence, so little prominence was given to so many long forgotten heroes, who were in the forefront of the struggle for Independence.

At least for the sake of the younger generation, the role these patriots once played, should have been highlighted. It was an opportune time to give due place to these patriots, who were not rewarded with public office or other tangible recognition after freedom was obtained, inspite of their unselfish sacrifice of careers, wealth and personal welfare, in the conflict with, what then seemed, the all powerful British Empire.

Today, politicians prance around in their high-tech, state- subsidised vehicles, surrounded by personal security, enjoying all the perks of office. Then, they risked their lives. Take the case of E.W. Perera, a Christian, who carried the notorious shoot-at-sight order of the then governor, in the sole of his shoe and crossed the torpedo-infested seas during the 1st World War, to present the plight of the imprisoned Buddhist leaders (such as D.S. and F.R. Senanayake), to the colonial authorities in London. The National Congress, to which they all belonged, was the nucleus from which most other political parties in Sri Lanka sprang.

Incidentally, it was when E.W. Perera was on this mission in London, trying to lobby members of the House of Commons to send a commission of inquiry to Ceylon, that he discovered the Lion flag, in the Chelsea barracks.

Rita Perera
Kelaniya

Give all teachers a fair chance

Government teachers have to serve three years in difficult areas. Teachers who have not done so get transfer letters to difficult areas every year but they invariably get their transfers cancelled through political influence.

Teachers who have had the misfortune to be appointed to serve in remote areas are therefore unable to get their transfers even after completing even more than three years of service in these difficult areas due to the severe shortage of teachers This surely is not fair.

Schools in some areas are overstaffed. Many teachers idle without any allotted duties. This is surely a wastage of a useful resource. Some teachers remain in the same popular schools of their own choosing for more than 20 or 30 years and retire at the same school, while others are not so privileged.

It is high time there was a national policy on the transfer of teachers giving all in this noble profession a fair and equal chance.

Nandalal Nanayakkara
Matara

Wanted: a home for Kandy's strays

Has anyone seen the dog pound at Gohagoda, Kandy? It is a hell - hole. If one sees this place of horror, one will not sleep for days.

There are a variety of dogs - fathers, mothers, small ones and big ones. Mothers are there with their puppies, some still with eyes unopened. The walls are coated with blood stains and there are even some with their entrails out, alive.

These dogs are caught on the streets of Kandy town in the most gruesome way. A noose is thrown round their necks, like a lasso - when drawn, it tightens the neck. Then, the dog-catcher lifts them almost throttling them and throws them into the van, at quite a height. The little ones die for the impact of the fall - so there are many dead on the floor of the van when it reaches the pound. They are kept there for three days before being 'destroyed'. Food is thrown in, the bigger and stronger ones eat and the weaker ones starve. The look on their faces is pathetic.

Then the animals are put in a closed chamber, through a small opening bearing a tube, kerosene is poured in and the kerosene set on fire. The smoke is force-pumped into the chamber with the dogs and these innocent dumb animals suffocated due to the carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide fumes amid agonizing death cries.

I think this is against all laws preventing cruelty to animals and should be banned. More modern and humane methods should be adopted.

We of the "KACPAW" (Association for Community Protection Through Animal Welfare) have had talks with the Mayor and Veterinary Surgeon with the idea of having combined clinics to sterilize and give these animals anti-rabies injections which is the only humanely practical way of eliminating rabies. Until such time, they have promised to give these animals to us instead of destroying them, "if we have a proper home".

So, I earnestly appeal to all animal lovers to please donate any abandoned building such as an old bungalow, an abandoned tea factory or even a small plot of land to start an animal home.

Dr. C.Godamunne
Kandy

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