FATHER OF THE NATION WHO DID NOT BOW DOWN TO EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL PRESSURES

Re-forestation and conservation of forests were given priority and topped the agenda Foresaw the disaster if war breaks out in countries that supplied food Initiated restoration of ancient irrigation systems and land reforms ‘Freedom for Japan’ was ini

As we commemorate the 65th death anniversary of Don Stephen Senanayake, the nation is facing a Constitutional crisis. The 1948 Constitution of Independent Sri Lanka did not give Buddhism the foremost place as done now. Sirimavo Bandaranaike, the PM discussing the provisions for the 1972 Constitution with the Principal Law officers, Attorney General Victor Tennekoon and Solicitor General Rajah Wanasundera being mindful of Article 5 of the 1815 Kandyan Convention, had requested them to draft an appropriate clause and had directed Dr. Colvin R de Silva, the good Marxist who also advocated two languages, and said, “two languages one nation, one language, two nations,” and who was responsible for the first 1972 Republican Constitution, to provide the “foremost place” to Buddhism. Colvin had quipped “she is thrusting the Kandyan Throne into our Constitution.”

This Article, ‘The Republic of Sri Lanka,’ shall give Buddhism the foremost place and accordingly it shall be the duty of the State to protect and foster Buddhism while assuring to all religions the rights granted by section 18 (1) (d), was followed by J.R. Jayewardene in the 1978 Constitution as well.

Article in 1815 convention read that, ‘The religion of Buddhoo, professed by the chiefs and inhabitants of these provinces is declared inviolable and its rites and ministers and places of worship are to be maintained and protected’. The slightly-different Sinhala version says not only the protection and maintenance of Buddhist temples but also Devagama (Hinduism) Devales or Hindu temples should be protected.

1948 CONSTITUTION AND D.S.

The drafting of Sri Lanka’s Independence Constitution appears relatively diluted in its nationalism. The 1948 Constitution, under which the Colonial rulers transferred powers of self rule to Ceylon, was designed mainly by the twosome D.S. Senanayake and Sir Ivor Jennings, the Constitutional expert. They shielded the Constitution drafting from nationalists on two sides: the anti-colonial nationalists, the Young Turks in the Ceylon National Congress, such as Dudley and JR who wanted to make Ceylon a ‘free republic’ and communistic nationalists who sought special protections for the island’s Sinhalese majority and non-sinhalese minority. D.S. was under pressure to include a special clause for Buddhism from the leading Buddhist clergy. A few days before, the two Mahanayakes of Asgiriya and Malwatta threatened to boycott the inauguration ceremony in Kandy. Prime Minister D S did not succumb but travelled to Kandy and convinced the two Mahanayake Theras on the importance of not introducing special provisions on protection to Buddhism in the new Constitution. He said, “If equality is a provision, then you cannot give primacy to one religion.”

The Mahanayake Theras realised the basic Buddhist principle ingrained in theabovestatement;theygaveupall protests and attended the ceremony. [Times of Ceylon - 9/1/1948 to 12/1/48]

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe recently said Buddhism would be given the foremost place in Sri Lanka’s new Constitution. The premier’s statement has made evident that the Yahapalana government would retain the special provision given to Buddhism in the ‘72 and ‘78 Constitutions. Therefore, the foremost place accorded to Sri Lanka’s majority religion of Buddhism will be preserved in its new Constitution, President Maithripala Sirisena too has affirmed the statement. DS as Minister of Agriculture from 1931 to 1947, based his thinking on Mahatma Gandhi’s famous conception ‘production by masses, instead of mass production’; he did focus on a policy of transforming to nonplantation agriculture

The British colonial authorities wanted to please the Buddhists with an ineffectual piece of inducement; Governor Brownrigg met the Kandyan Chiefs to discuss the convention and gave another audience on February 10, 1815 to the priests of the Malwatte and Asgiriya chapters, where on his own he assured that Buddhism and its properties and places of worship will be protected. The Kandyan Chiefs and bhikkhus agreed to the Kandyan Convention as it included clauses protecting their religion, and privileges. The fifth clause however, it must be pointed out, extended protection to Hinduism also.

D S - UNBOWED TO WESTERN POWERS

In early 1949, when the Commonwealth’s economic situation was in dire straits, they attempted to enforce authority over ‘Lipton’s Tea Estate’ by making a deliberate attempt to manipulate our strong Dollar Reserves by making us a party to the ‘Sterling Assets Agreement’. DS, in this serious issue, abundantly displayed his patriotism. The conflict situation that arose with the colonial authorities in 1949 resulted in a delegation led by J R Jayewardene, the finance minister along with his adviser John Exter, later the first Central Bank Governor, attending a Finance Minister’s Conference summoned by Briton at their request. DS was very much concerned over our dollar earnings; he wanted to maintain it as our own foreign reserves and advised the delegation on what they were to do if the British government rejected their appeal. He emphatically said,

“We are an independent nation. Our dollar earnings are our own .... , if we are not allowed to act independently then obviously we must leave the ‘Sterling Area...’, the UK government cannot oppose this. So go ahead and tell them you will leave unless you are permitted to keep your country’s earnings” - JR speeches - [Presid. Arch. File 195-a].

RESTORATION OF IRRIGATION SYSTEMS AND COLONISATION

To ease the pressure of populated South and DS believed that it was more advantageous for a man to grow rice like his ancestors had done, rather than waste his life selling cups of tea in a boutique or hawking on the pavement. He foresaw the disaster that the nation would face should a war break out in the countries from where the supplies of staple food was being made. DS as Minister of Agriculture from 1931 to 1947, based his thinking on Mahatma Gandhi’s famous conception ‘production by masses, instead of mass production’; he did focus on a policy of transforming to non-plantation agriculture. He initiated restoration of ancient irrigation systems and land reforms, created new colonization programs along with established colonization systems to provide land for the landless farmers. Re-afforestation and conservation of forests were taken up as priority areas in his agenda.

D. S. Senanayake entered politics when he was elected to the Legislative Council at the age of 40. Writing an article to a national daily after the death of the Prime Minister, the famous English author John Seymour [author, ‘Hard way to India’] states,

“The Prime Minister very amusingly told me, how he had made a train trip to Batticaloa, many years ago as Minister of Agriculture (under Donoughmore Constitution, in 1930’s) and how the train had stopped at a siding in the jungles of Minneriya. He had got down wandered off into the jungle and came across by accident the Minneriya Tank, which was abandoned for centuries. The farmer in him had struck immediately. He returned to Colombo, determined to push the government to commence restoration of the Tank and resettlement of dry zone.” – Ceylon Observer- 24/03/1952 - Courtesy; Nat. Arch.

Surpassing the intellectual capabilities of the ‘learned’ undoubtedly was his intuitive foresight and the urge for completion of a programme of work. His aversion to conventional book-education in school earned him his nick-name ‘Jungle John’: but in a remarkable coincidence he had an obsession for hiking jungle trails of the dry zone observing irrigable domain. He was by no means an intellectual but he was a man with brilliant intelligence. His academic qualifications would not have made him a low-ranking public servant, but he learned and gained knowledge by doing things, managing and meeting people. He did not interpret theories from text books, but perceived them by other means. His sort of understanding could not be gained through books or by theoretical study.

JAPANESE PEACE TREATY

J R Jayewardene’s famous San Francisco speech in 1951, at the Japanese Peace Treaty, obviously, the full credit should go to the man for his eloquent oratory, but only a few would realise that the idea, ‘freedom for Japan’ was initiated by none other than DS himself. The PM’S brief instructions to the delegation was, “We should not ask for reparations; and we should insist that Japan should recover her freedom.” That was all he told JR, who affirmed it. Addressing the supporters at the Airport on his return, JR said, “I return home after a job well done; I have done it on behalf of the Prime Minister whose instructions I carried out”—[de Silva/wriggins-1988: pp236,243]

Born on October 20, 1884, in a village called Botale in the Western Province, Sri Lanka to a devoted Buddhist family of Mudaliyar Don Spater Senanayake and Dona Catherina Elizabeth Perera Gunasekera as one of their four children. DS had two brothers, Fredrick Richard [FR] Senanayake and Don Charles Senanayake and one sister, Maria Frances. His first job after completing his education from the renowned private Anglican boys school ‘S. Thomas’ College’ in Mutwal, was at the Surveyor General’s Department as a clerk. Later he joined his father’s rubber plantations.

On March 22, 1952, this great man at the age of 68 succumbed to a stroke that he suffered while riding a horse at the ‘Galle Face Green’.

May he attain supreme bliss of Nibbana!