Rajpal's Column

24th May 1998

S. Thomas' , Royal College and the President

By Rajpal Abeynayake

\Drugs take Royal and S. Thomas'. Sensa tion. The UNP is to blame for it also. Did the leader of the opposition inhale as well? ( Some say he has not exhaled yet.)

This is the first time the UNP has been bashed for corrupting the two premier colonial remnants in our educational system. Apparently JR Jayewardene did not care tuppence about his alma mater. He planted hashish there.

The President has deemed that the polity should be particularly bothered that two particular educational institutions in the country have come under the influence of a modern day blight. But, it is a Presidential pronouncement. The UNP conspired to plant hashish heroin, LSD ganja what have you) in these two doddering institutions which are being regularly nicked by International Schools that are popping up all over the place. After all, the President sends her son and daughter to international schools. So where is the place for STC and Royal as the two premier educational institutions in the country?

But the President, she should know — she insists on keeping STC and Royal right there at the top. Insecure Royalists and Thomians will be saying "hats off to you, Madam. You put us right back there, where successive SLFP governments wanted to ensure we would not belong."

So it must be a sign of the times. It is the policy of the state to give back STC and Royal some of the lost shine, which was taken away partly due to the proletarian educational policies of successive SLFP governments, which preceded the present SLFP led coalition.

Now, the President insists on emphasising the predominance of Royal and S. Thomas'. She is sending the message to key and low-key private sector employers ( IBM John Keells, Roten Vander, the whole works ) that the Thomians and Royalists are the creme de la creme, the elite, the best of the best. Therefore, we suppose the private sector should start hiring these fellows, because they are the best, even though some of them ( drat it) have now taken to inhaling intoxicating drugs.With President Kumaratunga, the wheel has turned a full circle. She now insists that the SLFP are the champions of privatisation. She now gives back the throne to Royal and S. Thomas', even though the compliment may be tainted and albeit backhandish.

She says "even students of Royal and St. Thomas' have now become addicted to drugs." Can we try and deduce her line of thinking here? She thinks things are bad, but not so bad, if the hoi polloi take drugs in the maha vidyalaya's. Those are callow youth, ( maybe Jay Veee Pee Karaya's), but if the students from the country's two premier educational institutions take drugs, well that's a calamity.It is also incidental ( but she said it ) that the United National Party is responsible for the desecration of the two premier national schools. But, what's news. At one time or another, it has been said, that the United National Party has been responsible for everything that's wrong with this land , including irrepressible journalists.

But, to demonise the UNP, and apotheosise the two colleges that produced some of the key pillars of the UNP establishment, is even vaguely, to maintain two positions that are at odds. At bottom, Chandrika Kumaratunga stands for everything that the patricians of the UNP represented, privatisation, the liberalised economy ( a stronger dose) and now, the entrenching of two upper crust educational institutions as the premier educational institutions in the country.

So, if the PA stands for more or less the same things that the UNP stood for, how come the PA is gong to bequeath a different set of problems to what the UNP left behind when its term was up? That's hard guessing.

But, for the moment, about those two schools. The President says that some of the students from there are not averse to pulling a knife from under their socks when they "lose the Royal Thomian match." It's another matter that politicians always keep their daggers drawn. In the same speech, she had asserted that politics is a dirty game; that letting off politics is like letting off the Tiger's tail. One wonders why she is that afraid of letting go, if the legacy she is going to leave behind is lily white, unlike that of the UNP. But, that's an unnecessary question.

What's necessary is to wonder why our president ( bless her ) is so worried sick about a knife wielding psychopathic aberration at the Royal Thomian match if on her own admission, Parliament is infested with dirty men playing dirty games? It's a national trait, and she knows it best.

But, this thing about the two schools. It is difficult, yes, it is difficult, when one hails from Rosmead Place then Sorbonne and generally via that route, to cast ones mind away from the imagined importance of schools such as Royal and St. Thomas'.

President Premadasa came from a hoi polloi parripu Jinthupitiya background. ( Parippu being that trademark Royal Thomian put down word.) But, even he, couldn't resist being photographed at every Royal Thomian, like the rose between two thorns, between the Warden of S. Thomas' and the Principal of Royal at the Royal Thomian cricket match, that event of the year that politicians from a populist background would theoretically love to hate.

As for this President, she doesn't go there, physically, but her thoughts are always with these two schools. She talks of the Royal Thomian. She loves to hate these bad boys, the scoundrels, the scallywags, those wasters of parents money who take drugs.She laments that the UNP didn't take her son into Royal College, the brother's old school. But, whatever it may be, her thoughts are always with these boys. Not those boys. That must say something about our President.

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