My Dear Ranil,

I thought of writing to you after the horrible events of last week, at Ratnapura.

Now, I know those in your party are already saying that no one is guilty until they are proven guilty by a court of law. If memory serves me right, Premadasa said the same about the JVP.

Then, I know you will be complaining that the government is already using the incident to gain political advantage at the local polls. Yes, it is doing that in a big way. In this country, a political killing has been the easiest way to gain votes at an election. It happened with the killings of Bandaranaike and Athulathmudali and it will happen again now. Only you couldn't do it with Gamini's death.

But, for those ''tactics'' of winning votes over someone's death, we can only blame your party supporters for starting it all, though I dare say that some of the statements broadcast over Rupavahini were quite provocative instead of being designed to restore law and order!

Ranil, I think it's time you did something to clean up the image of your UNP and get rid of the thugs and hoodlums.

We all thought the gun culture that was enveloping us was slowly disappearing. And even the UNP, which relied so much on it was protesting when ''government'' thugs attacked them at incidents in Anamaduwa and Negombo. But now this has happened and the UNP appears to be still the old, thuggery-ridden party that it was while it was in office.

We know that being the Leader of the Opposition is a tough job, specially when all your previous years in politics have been spent in the government ranks. But now is the time to crack the whip on your party people. Or else, the UNP will be forgotten by the people, and you will be destined to be the Leader of the Opposition for ever.

Surely, it's bad enough when the Tigers are trying to explode bombs, whenever they can. But, despite all that, when the UNP and the PA are not getting together to fight the Tigers, but are busy, killing each other on the streets, we must ask ourselves, what kind of politicians are we electing to office?

And, the saddest part of the story is that Nalanda was such a clever young man with a great future ahead of him. Despite his politics, he had so few enemies. We hope, Ranil, that you would take the necessary steps within your party, so that his death won't be in vain.

Yours truly,

Punchi Putha.

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