Rajpal's Column

What should have happened in Sri Lanka

It's easy sitting in those parts, talking of Veerapan and Prabhakaran, to expect the Sri Lankan President to do something as nonsensical as lose her political future. When you are constantly thinking of fellows such as Veerapan ( a sandalwood smuggler and bandit who has killed over 53 people, and now wants to be a Member of Parliament from Karnataka !), you cannot be blamed for losing your sense of reality. This seems to be the poor Hindu Editor's predicament. 

But, the whole jiggery-pokery in Sri Lanka this week was high fun from any perspective, and was political theatre of such a farcical quality, that somebody has to write this into drama soon. 

First, the government created such an illusion of being serious about the Bill that even the best of elements of this society were getting the idea that something seriously historical was about to happen last week. 

But at least at the time of writing, some things had happened, which were so memorable that some novelist might write a work of "faction'' about the week of rudimentary constitutional farce. Veerapan and the likes can also move over.

But, what the President appeared to pull off was an "attempt''. In the Penal code, to draw a vague analogy by way of explanation, there are offenses that are defined, and there are attempted offenses that are separately defined. What the President did was to make an attempt, even though that attempt does not come under any defined in the Penal Code. 

Now, she can blame the UNP for eternity, for not allowing the passage of the package— and can use Ratnasiri Wickremanayake to woo back any love that was lost between her and the fraternity of Buddhist monkhood. But, in the melee, there have been so many MPs going abroad, who have been asking the question "will there be a country to come back to."

Then, there has been a taping scandal that would make a good Watergate with expletives suitably deleted. Then, there was the resignation of a Prime Minister, which was an event that was misinterpreted in some parts of the world as the resignation of the President. (An agitated Professor in New Delhi told his students that he had just heard over his car radio that the Sri Lankan President had resigned, and that Wickremesinghe has taken over the job. Poor man can't quite be blamed for getting his "Bandaras" and "Wickremes" mixed up – even though his discipline is political science…… ) 

But of course, the Professor's version is more like something that one would have thought would actually happen in Sri Lanka — given the fact that President Bandaranaike Kumaratunga was seen to be pushing the constitution as if she had been recently possessed. 

Is it difficult to imagine the scenario anyway? Let us see. President Bandaranaike Kumaratunga is so revolted by political betrayal by the other parties, that she decides enough is enough. She decides she is a states-person, not a political contortionist. She decides that a dramatic resignation would at least give the message to the people that she is not in this for politics but is in it for the sake of the redemption of the Sri Lankan state. 

Her dramatic resignation leaves no alternative, as parliament is thrown in chaos, after the obvious is realized that the incumbent Prime Minister cannot take over. (At the time of the President's resignation, Sirimavo Bandaranaike is still the Prime Minister.). Parliament, thrown into chaos, regretfully votes to appoint Ranil Wickremesinghe President for the rest of the term, even though it is now not certain what Kumaratunga political future will be – not to mention the country's. 

But, no, the Indian Professor's sense of drama was misplaced. What happened in fact, was again, closer to farce than to tragedy, when the senior Bandaranaike was replaced by another Wickreme who never really aspires to be a nayake anyway. 

But constantly , Sri Lankan politics of recent times has not been able to produce any genuine theatre due profoundly to the fact that there are no genuine actors on the stage.

Now, the farce will play on. Much money has been thrown at Members of Parliament, upto a point that none of them are quite recognizable anymore, but that's another mater. 

Meanwhile, President Chandrika Kumaratunga's last calculated attempt seems to have succeeded, for the simple reason that it was never designed really to succeed. With pliable others, however, she wanted to tinker the electoral system to make things more easier for the party in the melee — but that plan failed even if it was not designed to. But in the rush of angst, that element of tragedy was forgotten. 

Various tales can and will be told about this week of enlivening farce. It will be said mostly that this was the final tragedy — or that it was a narrow shave for a country that could have written itself into a constitutional suicide pact. But, for me, this is a great period. Like somebody already did about the stormy period in which Bangladesh was created, somebody should write a novel about this past week. Penguin can't wait.

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