Remembrance Day Parade
The 6th Ranaviru Commemoration Day Parade, held yesterday at Beach Road in Matara was a solemn and dignified occasion sans fanfare and colour.
It was unlike the Victory Day ceremonies held under the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime.
The entire ceremony lasted less than three hours when compared with the four and half hours or more in earlier years. There were no cultural shows and songs of praise by students. The number of armed forces and police personnel who participated in the parade was less than on previous occasions while President Maithripala Sirisena did not inspect the guard of houour provided by the police and armed forces’ personnel as in the past.
The 21-gun salute to the Head of State and the guard of honour were accorded as usual but there was no ‘Jayamangala Gatha’ sung by schoolgirls.
Nearly 3,052 personnel including 203 officers and 80 armoured cars, tanks, missile-carriers and multi-barrel rocket launchers from the Sri Lanka Army participated in the parade while 1,391 personnel including 224 officers, 11 vehicles and 18 vessels and ships from the Sri Lanka Navy took part in the parade. Some 819 personnel, 97 officers and 43 vehicles, 31 fighter jets, helicopters and planes from the Air Force took part in the parade. The fly-past by the Air Force, the sail-past by the Navy and parachute-jumping by three females and sixteen males received resounding rounds of applause from the appreciative gathering. Former President Chandrika Kumaratunga and Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka were conspicuous by their presence for the first time at this annual event while Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa and Chief Justice K. Sripavan were conspicuous by their absence.