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Sethu Das / March 07, 2010
The Land Minds of Sri Lanka
Soon after the killing of Lasantha Wikramatunge, Editor of 'The Sunday Leader', by the Sri Lankan government forces, Design & People Co-Founder Sethu Das travelled to Sri Lanka to meet with Ravindra Ranasinha, one of Lasantha's close associates in journalism and a known Sinhalese theatre activist.

BY the time this story was completed, the European Union announced the withdrawal of its GSP+ tariff benefits to Sri Lanka — the only country in South Asia to have this status. Benefits to the tune of US$116 million were lost on the grounds that there were serious shortcomings in implementation as per the UN Human Rights Convention. This latest move by the EU is going to affect more than one lakh textile and apparel workers in the country.

The island nation has had to deal with several issues — a troubled economy, civil war, ethnic conflict, poverty, unemployment, and child prostitution being some among them. The long fight between the Sri Lankan army and the Tamil rebels has already displaced millions of ordinary people; it has also resulted in the death of more than 70,000 people. Sri Lanka is also probably the only conflict zone in the world which continues to debate on the nation's standard time. The Sri Lankan Standard Time was moved back by 30 minutes in April 2006 to match with the Indian Standard Time (IST) and to make use of the daylight. This new standard time was adapted against the wishes of the country's scientists and astrologers, and is yet to be accepted by the reluctant Tamil community.

At the same time, the island nation is slowly opening up to multinationals, to replace its army bunkers with Automatic Teller Machines, and check-posts with Kentucky Fried Chicken stores. The time is not far when a resource-rich country like Sri Lanka becomes one of the best economies in South Asia.

As a country that shares a cordial relationship with Chairman Mao's People's Republic of China, Sri Lanka too believes in the power that flows from the barrel of a gun. A good number of the country's journalists have either been eliminated or tortured by government forces. Like Lasantha Wikramatunge, Editor of The Sunday Leader, shot dead by the Sri Lankan army on January 08, 2009.

I decided to meet one of his close associates — Ravindra Ranasinha, a veteran journalist and a well known Sinhalese theatre activist. His inspiring writings are usually published in 'Irudina' of 'The Sunday Leader', a newspaper known for its unbiased journalism on the island. Ravindra's theatre productions focus mainly on diverse social issues of Sri Lanka. He is among those rare few who truly understand the real political scenario and the dubious role played by non-governmental organisations in the ethnic conflict of Sri Lanka. These qualities have made Ravindra a controversial figure in the orthodox Sinhalese community and also a target of extremist Buddhist groups. I believe it is necessary to understand and recognise the humble contributions of Ravindra Ranasinha, a Sinhalese who has struggled for decades to bring about peace and harmony between the two divided communities in Sri Lanka.

Excerpts from a conversation:

Sethu Das:
Before we discuss the conflict in Sri Lanka, let me ask you a question about your theatre background. You've been in the Sinhalese theatre for the last two decades and are responsible for directing some of the most controversial plays. But how active is the modern Sinhalese theatre in Sri Lanka?

Ravindra Ranasinha:
The modern Sinhala theatre has had its own history since the 1950s. The problem we face presently is that theatre has become zero, or has gone down drastically due to the conflict situation in the country. The 50s saw a revival of literature in Sri Lanka, with a lot of focus on poetry, novels, plays and experimental theatre. During this period Prof Sarachchandra from the Peradeniya University explored options regarding the kind of theatre to be established in Sri Lanka. Prof Sarachchandra travelled to India, USA, Japan and Russia to explore possibilities. In Japan and India he found something similar to the culture of Sri Lanka — Kathakali in Kerala, and Kabuki in Japan — two theatre forms that use mythology, music and local dance forms to tell a story. He saw this as a possibility in the Sri Lankan context. Because Sri Lankan theatre is more about song and dance, not just verbal. A theatre of presentation and expressionism. While Kathakali was very expressive and intellectual, Kabuki theatre was very beautiful because of its gorgeous and 'mega' costuming and stage designing. He also travelled to the USA, but observed that the theatre there was very open when it came to dealing with issues such as sexuality and human relationships — something he felt would not appeal to the people back in Sri Lanka. So he overlooked that aspect completely. Equipped with the oriental experience of India and Japan, he put up his first play called 'Maname' — a folk tale of a prince and princess from the city of Varanasi in India.

Prof Sarachchandra brought a scientific approach as he conducted the first ever experiments in Sri Lankan theatre. His plays were of a psychological nature, something which Sri Lanka did not have earlier. Our theatre, though expressionistic, was without a proper structure, and very focused on the folk traditions. We used masks and jokes, but lacked the drama created by a taut story line. It was more a collection of folk songs, folk poetry and folk dance. But Prof Sarachchandra brought all of these together and raised it from the level of folk art to pure art.

After 1956 a lot of experimentation was done in theatre by Sugathapala De Silva, Dr Henry Jayasena and Gunaena Galapatty — by studying foreign plays and adapting them for local communities, thereby leading to a total theatrical revival. And all these took place against the political backdrop of the emergence of Solomon West Ridgeway Dias Bandaranaik — Chandrika Kumaratunge's father, the man responsible for introducing Sinhala as the only official language of the island. Bandaranaik was in the United National Party (UNP) at the time and wanted the Premiership. While Sir John Kotelawala went to Jaffna and promised people that both Tamil and Sinhala would be made official languages, Solomon WRD Bandaranaik promised Sinhala as the official language of the country and the people gave all their votes to him who then became the Prime Minister. And, Sinhala became the official language — thus leading to a lot of enthusiasm among people and the development of Sinhalese literature and dramas.

Prof Sarachchandra's initial plays were propagandist in nature and content. Art and politics have always been bed-fellows in the history of Sri Lanka, and this trend continues till date. Dramatists cashed in on people's enthusiasm and hope in those heady days in Sri Lankan history, leading to a revival. Dr Henry Jayasena, inspired by foreign plays, adapted them and made realistic plays mixed with the traditional dance theatre of Sri Lanka. Sugathapala De Silva was very critical of the political conditions and wanted to break away from Sarachachandra's traditional drama concept, so he focused completely on realistic theatre. He did some fantastic plays like "Dunna Dunu Gamuwe", which depicted the worker's struggles and inspired workers at that time to come out fighting for their rights. Sugathapala De Silva was himself a part of the 1980s worker's struggle. He was with the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation then, but was thrown out later.

"We call this country a Buddhist country. Unfortunately it is the very same Buddhist monks responsible for developing the spirituality of the people who are now warring. How can you expect our people to develop maitri as preached by Lord Buddha? Maitri is not just love, but immense and passionate love towards the other. Healthy relationships are dreams in this country," says Ravindra Ranasighe. (Photo: Sethu Das)

Nearly a hundred thousand people lost their jobs during JR Jayewardene's regime, due to his policies. The 70s saw Bandaranaike focusing on touching political issues at the surface level, not going very deep. Authoritarian dictatorship was developing in the country at this time and during the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) insurrection SWRD Bandaranaike was murdered by a monk. After his assassination, his wife Sirimao Bhandarayanake came to power and the country witnessed a wave of capitalism. In this climate of economic deprivation, people were finding it very difficult to live their lives. At this time, Rohana Wijeweera came down from Lumumba in Russia to organise JVP and led the young people against Sirimao Bhandanayake's regime. More than 50,000 youth were killed by the state machine. The theatre of the 70's mainly dwelt on these issues of authoritarianism and how the people were crushed economically and politically. In 1977 JR Jayewardene introduced free economic policies which led to opportunities for local business people to venture into different markets. Even Jaffna was a good market for the Sinhalese.

In 1983, the Tamil people were suppressed, businesses collapsed and an organised military-state action against the Tamils resulted in riots. Prabhakaran emerged at this time. 13 Sinhalese soldiers were killed by his group — LTTE and the state began a long standing retaliation with the Tamils. A sad fallout of this was we lost some of our most valuable books kept in the Jaffna Library, where many Sinhalese scholars were educated.

In the 80s, the country was completely in the grip of totalitarianism. Nobody could really come out as Jayewardene was a very strict president. He had no choice actually. Chauvinism was aggravating and disseminating into every corner of the country, and he was in no position to stop it. The extremist Sinhalese counterpoint of Sirimao Bhandranayake revealed the many discrepancies of the Jayewardene period. Businesses flourished, the rich got richer with more money in banks — especially foreign banks, while the working class suffered. Large scale unemployment, worker's strikes, all these were increasingly leading the nation into a state of chaos. The suppressive policies of the 80's sounded a death knell, for the literary revival of the 1950s.

Our theatre group emerged under the guidance of Dr Solomon Fonseka from Czechoslovakia, who had pursued a PhD in method acting, and inter-mingled it with western and oriental concepts. Our initial step was to try our plays against the totalitarian regime. Our group decided not to go for original scripts in the beginning but work with foreign scripts as they were already popular, they would get us more recognition and would not threaten our lives. We wanted to revive the theatre which had witnessed a downfall during the mid 1980s. So we selected 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'.