He lived his life the way he served the police

Seekku Baduge Wimalasena De Silva, well known as “SBW,” departed this world on June 25. He was a household name in the police, and enjoyed the respect and admiration of society for he was an exemplar of honour, rectitude, honesty and principles.

SBW lived the way he worked as a policeman, and he applied to his profession, the same principles he observed in his private life. He left no room for anyone to find fault or raise questions; and he assiduously practised the same standards in his profession.

To think that I sing praises of someone who retired only as a Senior Superintendent of Police may confound many. What requires to be told is how and why he retired prematurely, at a relatively young age of 51 years. Of course the rank of SSP was a highly respected post then, whereas we now cannot escape brushing against a surfeit of Senior DIGs and DIGs.

SBW retired prematurely because the way he lived and worked convinced him that he should not accommodate the injustices evident in the 1970s and 1980s where juniors, abetted by politicians, plundered promotions at the expense of the line of seniority. To a good officer, his place in the line of seniority would at all times be sacred and inviolate; and in the case of SBW, he was not the type to chase after a politician to protect and safeguard his position in the line of seniority. How he reacted to an injustice was not to fight it with unjust methods, but to retire from a service in which he had lost all hope. In a way, by such premature retirement, he exercised greater prescience than all of us, for he knew exactly which way the wind was blowing.

But the service lost a unique officer, not only for his sterling ethics and qualities, but also his knowledge, experience and efficiency. He adorned the roles he played in the CID and the Intelligence services. He is yet talked about as being a model officer in charge of police stations, and probably the best director of police training, basic and advanced. SBW received the baton for the best overseas student at a course steered by the Metropolitan Police in Hendon, UK. It was unfortunate that those in the highest seats had failed to exploit this remarkable achievement. It was a tragedy that his full potential was not tapped. His enormous and exceptional talents and skills could have helped the service bloom if there was an environment propitious for the growth and development of the service.

Having known SBW well for long, I feel that he would have been a unique asset in respect of reforms and far reaching changes to the police. At one time, and hopefully if the wind blew my way, I had in mind to canvass the expertise of SBW and another officer who is no more with us, Achilles Joseph, to completely reorganise police headquarters. SBW, with his sharp intellect, probing mind, capacity to see the larger picture, and above all, his unerring skill to spot loopholes in any situation, would have been ideal to help usher reforms to the service which is desperately in need of them.

SBW never sought material assets. He did not chase after prominence or a “place in the sun”. He derived great pleasure from being the fulcrum of the Retired Senior Police Officers Association for countless years, a service he rendered selflessly. He was a role model not only to those who aspire to be professionals, but in the art of living as well. He was a martinet, because the compromise of sacred principles and ethics was alien to him.

SBW was a good Buddhist in every sense, for when living, and at work, he kept a considerable distance from craving, desire, acquisition, and ambition: All he sought at work was a sense of fulfilment and achievement. We express our profound sorrow to his grieving spouse Dharma, and his daughters. We have already seen ample proof as to how they had imbibed the ethics and values of a truly great human being, a legend of the police.

Merril Gunaratne