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Dispose
PTA cases quickly, says SC The Bench comprising Justices Mark Fernando, Ameer Ismail and C.V.Wigneswaran having heard the fundamental rights application of a 28-year-old Tamil man who alleged he was arbitrarily arrested, tortured and detained for six months without being indicted or discharged, considered it essential for a ruling so as to avoid such a situation in the future. "We consider it necessary that the Inspector General of Police and the Commissioner General of Prisons should submit a statement to the Attorney General with a copy to the Registrar of the Supreme Court setting out the names and places of detention of all persons detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act indicating also whether any of them have been produced before the Judicial Medical Officer or a medical officer for examination and report, and if so which officer." Such an order came in the wake of what was seen as poor co-ordination between the police who arrest and detain persons under suspicion, State Counsels who indicted in the High Court and those who appear before the Supreme Court in related fundamental rights applications filed by the victims alleging arbitrary action. Court directed the petitioner in this case, Karunanithi Hari Samankumar be forthwith released from custody subsequent to the State Counsel informing court that the Attorney General has decided to withdraw the indictment filed in the High Court of Jaffna which had not been served on the petitioner, who was incidentally not produced before the High Court. Bail
applications postponed The case was
called before Colombo High Court Judge Sarath Ambepitiya, last Tuesday.
Applications filed on behalf of Rukman Herath and Sujeewa Kannangara
have cited humanitarian grounds. Both Mr. Srinath Perera PC, Counsel
for the 1st accused Herath, and Mr. Ranjit Abeysuriya PC for the
2nd accused Kannangara individually moving the bail applications
filed on behalf of their clients, on a previous occasion, submitted
that the daughter of one of their clients was suffering from trauma
and mental instability as a result of their father being away from
home. Both were sentenced for seven years RI each on the first count and two years RI each on the second count. They were also ordered to pay a fine of Rs. 10,000 and in the event of default one years RI. Conscience
Bill stirs the SLFP Mr. W.D.J. Sene-viratne
told the Sunday Times that the Party is yet to take a decision on
this bill and said that some of the PA members of parliament support
it. Mr. Fowzie speaks of a National Government and that too would depend on the SLFP deciding to join in its formation. Mr. Jeyaraj Fernandopulle said that he personally supports the bill as it was crossovers that enabled the formation of the SLFP in 1951 and further this bill meant that a MP who is now a stooge of the party secretary would have a better say and listened to by the party hierarchy, he said. The official
PA spokesman Dr Sarath Amunugama said that the so called bill of
conscience has not been even drafted nor has it been discussed at
the cabinet. Several
districts blindfolded-top surgeon Consultant Ophthalmologist Dr. Reggie Seimon said that Hambantota, Vavuniya and Moneragala districts also had no fully qualified Ophthalmologists while two more newly qualified consultants were also being assigned to Colombo. According to Dr. Seimon some 81,000 people are blind in both eyes while more than 54,000 are suffering from severe visual problems due to cataracts. He said Sri Lanka now had reasonable health manpower to safely render sight through cataract surgery but the problem was inequitable distribution of the human resources. At present Sri
Lanka has 26 fully qualified Ophthalmologists, 16 eye surgeons with
diploma in Ophthalmology, six Senior Registrars, qualified but awaiting
training abroad and 54 Ophthalmic Registrars with over four years
surgical training. The appointments of Consultant Ophthalmologists to Gampaha, Wathupitiwela and Colombo South were unwarranted, especially since Colombo South had no ward facilities, theatre time or equipment, he said. Dr. Seimon who
is regarded as a father figure in eye surgery said some of the fully
qualified and Diploma qualified surgeons were not provided with
the basic necessities, by the Ministry of Health, to do surgery
with lens implantation. "Eager young hands are idling in the
periphery. Some of them may decide to emigrate at least to get job
satisfaction. Sri Lanka has 26 Districts and geographically it certainly
extends beyond the
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