Financial Times

Bentota villas va Taj
Sad end to the charming Villas of Bentota?
By Julian West, The Sunday Telegraph

One of the south-west coast's loveliest and most pristine beaches - and a cluster of small, luxury hotels, originally conceived of by Geoffrey Bawa as garden sanctuaries - is being threatened by a tourist development that critics say will destroy the beach, its wildlife and the livelihood of the old hotels.

The proposal to construct a line of up-market tourist bungalows on the protected strip of coconut palms and mangroves, in front of the existing hotels on the beach, south of Bentota, has been put forward by India's Tata Group which runs the Taj
Exotica, a five-star hotel on the promontory at the northern end of the beach.

A similar plan proposed by Taj eight years ago was vetoed by the Tourism Minister of the time, S. Thondaman, after a public outcry. He declared that the Green Belt, which was acquired from the original owners in the 1960s by the Tourist Board, for conservation purposes, was "inviolable".

Opponents of the new development believe that it will destroy the boutique hotels, which are the only beachfront properties of their kind in the island, by ruining their access to the sea and the surrounding environment. This includes the beach, which will be eroded by construction, if the plan goes ahead, as well as its plant and wildlife. Five species of turtle nest on this beach, among them, the Kemps Ridley and the endangered Olive Ridleys; and about 70 different species of migrating birds, including kingfishers, herons, storks and Fish owls inhabit the mangroves.

"If this development goes ahead it will have disastrous consequences", said Ismeth Rahim, the well-known architect and environmentalist. "Not only will it cause serious erosion of the beach, the whole natural eco-system of plant life, bird life and the nesting ground for endangered turtles will be destroyed. That strip by the railway line should have been permanently frozen".

Ever since Geoffrey Bawa and his friend, S.M.A.Hameed, first conceived of small, beautifully designed hotels that would harmonise with nature, independent travellers - among them, celebrities like Sir Paul McCartney and Bo Derrick - have stayed at the Mohotti Walauwa, the Villa and the adjoining "boutique" hotels, attracted by their privacy and tranquillity and one of the south-west coast's loveliest beaches.

Bawa's idea was to create a hotel that was more like a private house set in a lush, landscaped garden, with weathered windows and doorways open to the sea-breeze and the scent of flowering trees. A place where the only sounds were the roar of the ocean, the rustle of the wind in the palms and the occasional hoot of the small coastal train, clattering southwards.

The idea of an eco-friendly tourist hotel was years ahead of its time. But it worked - and has become increasingly popular. Even during the years of falling tourist numbers, the cluster of small hotels in Bentota maintained a faithful clientele of locals, expatriates and returning visitors who wanted solitude and personalised service, rather than "buffets and calypso bands". Today, the villas offer accommodation to about 120 people and employ some 130 local staff, and even in the off season they are often fully occupied.

Now though, the natural charm and solitude which attracted these travellers, year after year, is likely to be devastated, and with it the livelihood of the hoteliers. This week, Lakshman Ekayanake, a spokesman for the Tata Group, said that although their plan is still "in the embryonic stage, the government has approved it, in principle". The Tatas are now waiting for further approval from the Coastal Conservation Board and an assessment report on the environmental impact.

Ekanayake also said that the Group, which is keen to invest in transport, software technology, automobiles and plantations as well as hotels, "sees great potential in Sri Lanka". In addition to owning the Taj in Colombo and running the existing hotel in Bentota, the Tatas are also interested in developing tourism on the east coast.

"We are keen to develop in Trincomalee and Batticaloa", said Ekanayake. "But because the situation there is still somewhat unstable, we asked the government to give us the land in Bentota".

Critics of the Bentota plan point out that not only is the site chosen by the Tata Group impractical: their proposed "luxury" villas will back immediately on to the railway line and the sea there is notoriously dangerous; but that very little of the money made or spent by foreign investors like the Tatas benefits Sri Lanka. In addition, the package tourists that their brand of hotels tend to attract, pay for their holidays abroad and spend very little in the island, unlike individual travellers.

"This sort of investment doesn't go into the country", said Rahim. "Hameed and his fellow hoteliers manufactured and built everything locally and their customers spend directly. The Tatas will bring materials in and take their profits home and, as a BOI registered company, they get a 15-year tax break. In the end, it's the country that picks up the tab for all the environmental degradation".

Beneath the opposition to the current proposal by the Tatas is also a deeper fear. The Bentota development is apparently part of a wider government plan to build casinos, nightclubs and more luxury hotels in Bentota and possibly elsewhere in the island. Many Sri Lankans view this as an alarming trend, begun when the country was desperate to attract tourists, that flies in the face of the world trend towards eco-tourism and will eventually destroy the island's most precious asset: its natural beauty.

"There was an article in an overseas paper headlined: "Visit Sri Lanka before it's destroyed", said Hameed, who owns The Club Villa. "The luxury of Sri Lanka is space and natural beauty. Now is the time we should be preserving that because if we don't, we'll be finished".

While many people concede that there may be a desire and even a need for hotels and resorts that cater to various kinds of tourists, they wonder why one has to be sacrificed to accommodate the other.

"Why carry out this particular development there?" asked one foreign resident in Sri Lanka who has often stayed in the Bentota villas.

"There are surely other sites. Why ruin the only really nice places to stay on any of the south coast beaches?"

Bawa, the man who had a seminal influence on Sri Lankan architecture, died two weeks ago, aged 84. In his legacy of exquisite private houses and gardens, hotels and the serenely beautiful parliament in Kotte was one small gem of an idea: the charming homes-away-from home in Bentota. Those who have enjoyed many happy days in these hotels will mourn their passing as much as his.

As one frequent local visitor said: "It seems a poor tribute to the man who has done more than anyone to bring a sense of beauty to this island".