Rajpal's Column

10th January 1999

Kiribath days, and thoughts at the Bandaranaike walauwa

By Rajpal Abeynayake

If SWRD Bandaranaike and Sirima Bandaranaike can be considered the patriarch and matriarch of post independent politics, then Anura Bandaranaike and Chandrika Bandaranaike have to be by default considered their political offspring. Not that this is a quibble about the paternity of any of these persons , the kind of quibble only practiced by the famous General Ratwatte of horseback and camouflage fame….

True that Anura Bandaranaike and Chandrika Kumaratunge are the biological progeny of SWRD Bandaranaike whose 100th birth anniversary fell this week.. But apart from biological fact, they symbolise the generation of politicians that succeeded the older Bandaranaike's.

So if Sirimavo and SWRD were in the kitchen today , talking of politics, and if the grand leader (bless his soul) lived to be a hundred, what would he be talking about over a cuppa and a kiribath ? (Now, this is not to proceed in the same vein as those "politician dies and goes to heaven'' parodists.) So, parody and vilification aside, what would the older generation of Bandranaikes have thought, over a cup of tea or a piece of kiribath, say, over that old long walauwa table in 1999?

To begin with, maybe SWRD Bandaranaike would have recoiled at the cloying sentiments that are being expressed in the newspapers of the day in an attempt to make him larger than life. Yet, he would have to concede, at least to his inner self, that he was perhaps larger than life.

Say, perchance, if Mr. Bandaranaike was not assassinated in 1956, but merely suffered a debilitating stroke that put him out of politics forever? Then, on his hundredth birthday he would have perhaps been in that walauwa kitchen sharing that conversation with the political wife who took over from him. He would have had to concede, perhaps grudgingly , perhaps modestly, that his contribution to post independence Sri Lanka was phenomenal even though his vision was prematurely arrested by the events of 1958.

But perhaps, Mr. Bandaranaike would also not be so magnanimous in his self - assessment as his successors are on his hundredth birthday. Mr. Bandaraniake would have credited himself for having resurrected the soul of the Sinhala people, but it is unlikely that he would have no regrets about unleashing some nationalistic forces .He would have regrets and perhaps be contrite over the fact that he resurrected not just Sinhala nationalism but a repellent force in Tamil nationalism as well. In a process of political induction, his Sinhala revival generated a nostalgia and an appetite for Tamil revivalism simultaneously , he might think . He would muse that if he continued his leadership, he would have put things right as he had the character and the statesmanship to do so…..

And if he did, would he have done things differently? Perhaps he would think, as he bites into the kiribath, that a lot of water had flowed under the bridge since 1956. He would tell his wife, that other consummate politician, that inevitabilities are inevitabilities.

He would perhaps even concede, maybe only to his wife, that 1956 was a mistake without the Bandaranaike - Chelvanayakam pact taking place as the following chapter. But he would perhaps even look at the brighter side of things and come to the conclusion that the Sinhala revival was worthy of any mistakes that might have happened as a result of it. He would perhaps tell his wife that he is after all the true father of the Sinhala speaking graduates…those young bloods of the Sri Lanka Administrative Service who came from the village and ended up ruling the towns…. His wife would have perhaps agreed that giving back the people their soul was a visionary move, and that any of the consequences were not necessarily negating his singular achievement.

But then, if the political patriarch would have put down some things to inevitability, would he then bite into the last of the kliribath and look back at what went on after him with a sense of satisfaction, even smugness? Were the forces he unleashed respectably controlled by the practical political generation which followed him? How did his successors do with the vision he left behind, even though they were practical men and women and not visionaries in his mould?

He would perhaps remember in this week , the week of his hundredth birthday that Sir John Kotelawala and he fought some very nasty political battles that almost descended to thuggery. Or no, these battles were thuggery, he would think.

With a chuckle he would remember , even enjoy , recalling the image of Sir John who was always that naughty boy in those days. Irreverent , irreverent even of him , Bandranaike himself. But, then perhaps his wife would tell him that there is terrible news today from Wayamba about politics there, which had erupted into some kind of mini war even though there was no real "situation" in the south. Perhaps the grand old man would shake his head, not in disbelief, but in acknowledgment of the fact that he is not so senile as to be tuned out.

He would have to think bluntly, if one can think bluntly, that this political flotsam and jetsam is not what he bargained for when he dreamed his dreams in 1956.

A vision can end in upheaval , but, can a grand vision have given rise to these banalities and these trite but deadly bloodspots that pass off for national politics? Can the 1956 Sinhala graduate end up giving way to all these political baubles which are participating in this banal political exercise?

Perhaps he would think that it's ironical that the generation he bequeathed is represented by his own blood — a daughter in one party and a son in another party which are the main players at these, er, Wayamba or something elections. Would he not gag on that kiribath?

Commentary

Editorial/Opinion Contents