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Speech by Jayantha Dhanapala, former UN Under Secretary for Disarmament Affairs who was Chief Guest at the Trinity College, Kandy Prize-Giving on February 13.

In 1993 the then Principal of Trinity invited me to be the Chief Guest at the Junior School Prize-giving. Today - eleven years later - I have been promoted as Chief Guest at the Upper School Prize-giving. The graduation from Junior School to Upper School usually takes much less time but there are distinct advantages in being a 'late developer' and my wife and I are very happy to be here!

The most important of these advantages is that I am privileged to share this platform with you, Mr. Principal, on what is your very first Prize-day at Trinity after your inauguration as the 17th Principal in the 132 year old history of this unique educational institution. May I therefore begin by congratulating you warmly on your appointment and wishing you a most productive and fulfilling tenure at Trinity in the service of what we Trinitians modestly call 'the best school of all'. You are heir to a rich heritage and follow in the footsteps of some great Trinity Principals. You yourself bring to your tasks the selfless commitment of a missionary; the seasoned expertise of a trained educationist; and the international experience of working amidst the cultural, ethnic and religious diversity of South Asia - all of them qualities that Trinity needs at this juncture of its history.

As we all know Trinity has recently passed through difficult times - not the least because our society and our country has had to endure tumultuous upheavals and violent challenges to our fundamental values. Trinity could not have remained an oasis or a Shangri-La of perfection. Still less could it have been an ostrich burying its head in the sand. The late Dag Hammarksjold - himself one of the most successful Secretaries-General of the United Nations - famously said, quoting his predecessor, that his was 'the most impossible job on this earth'. In my view the accurate job description or the Principal of Trinity would be 'the second most impossible job on this earth'! You will be besieged by those who will give you gratuitous advice on how you should manage Trinity. Others will try to micro-manage the school for you.

And still others will criticize every well-meaning step you take from the comfort of their armchairs. As an old boy whose family has been linked wit Trinity for five generations all I will say to you Mr. Principal is - be patient with them all and in the immortal words of Shakespeare's Polonius.

'This above all: to thine own self be true'! To all old boys, parents, staff and other well-wishers of the school, let me appeal for constructive unity and for the loyal support of the new Principal in his efforts to transform our beloved institution into a modern school to be of service to our country and the world. I pledge you Sir, my own modest support and co-operation.

May I now take the opportunity of congratulating all the prize-winners on their splendid success? To those who did not win prizes - and I am not ashamed to say that I was sometimes in that category - may I say that you also deserve to be congratulated because you also competed and, unwittingly perhaps, pushed the winners to extra heights to win their prizes. Prizes are like benchmarks that are set for the entire group to aim at. They are a celebration of the achievements not only of individuals but also of the entire school in which we take collective pride. The words of the Buddhist monk-poet Totagamuwe Sri Rahula from the 15th century Sinhala classical poem, the Kavya-sekharaya, setting the bar for all students are still relevant:-

"Guru sitha noridhawa
Waylawa nowaradhawa
Bethipem upadawa
Akuru ugani kumaru sondhawa"

My English translation of those words, written about 550 years ago, about the model student would be,

"Respecting his teacher's wishes,
Observing unfailing punctuality,
Imbued with loyalty and devotion,
The student learns his letter diligently"

I will try not to abuse the privilege of this platform by converting it into a bully pulpit for my views on the state of the country. What I do want to do is to repay my debt to Trinity by identifying, as best I can, what components in my invaluable Trinity experience helped me in my career and what continues to sustain me in my life. The pioneering role of Trinity as a Christian Missionary School founded during the British colonial period, but blending gracefully with indigenous cultural traditions as the Collage Chapel, had already been challenged when I entered the school following the family tradition. Trinity had opted to be a fee-levying independent school albeit subject to the supervision of the education authorities of the country. Amidst the swirling tide of post Independence nationalism and majoritarianism, Trinity remained steadfastly true to its values of inculcating genuine patriotism, a deep knowledge and respect for our national languages and culture, religious tolerance and a robust sense of community and solidarity in which the individual was important as the group he belonged to. All this was accomplished while the school maintained the highest standards of academic scholarship providing opportunities for sports, the arts and other creative talents.

So first of all it is this historical sense of being fortunate successors to a great tradition as well as its responsible custodians that makes Trinity unique. My academic training for my first degree in English Literature led me to read the poetry and prose of T. S. Eliot who in his famous essay on "Tradition and the Individual Talent" defined 'tradition' as being much more than following what preceding generations had achieved. Let me quote the words of Eliot," Tradition is a matter of much wider significance.

It cannot be inherited, and if you want it you must obtain it by great labour. It involves, in the first place, the historical sense which.....involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence.....a sense of the timeless as well as of the temporal and of the timeless and of the temporal together......." In other words tradition is not merely the ritualistic repetition of what was done in the past for its own sake but for the relevance of its content to the present.

That is why Trinity can never been an anachronism or out of step with the times. Tradition is the distilled wisdom of our forbears, which we are free to build upon, but which we discard at our peril. Our predecessors in Trinity set by high standards and we are being judged by those standards even as we try to add inches to them.

Flowing from this historical sense of tradition is the lesson that institutions, as the accretion of individual achievements over the years, are ultimately what endure the test of time. The relationship between the individual and the institution is a symbiotic one. Neither is more important than the other.

Heretical as it may sound to some die-hard old Trinitians, the legendary Rev. A. G. Fraser of Trinity may well have left his footprints to be erased in the sands of time had he not worked in Trinity where he is immortalised. A favourite quotation of mine in my days as a diplomat was the words of Jean Monnet, the architect and inspirational genius of the modern European Union, who once said," Nothing is possible without men; but nothing is lasting without institutions."

I was fortunate therefore to be a student in a great institution, which represented the sum total of the contributions of many previous generations of staff and students and much more.

As an individual I was conscious to my insignificance in the institution and at the same time the need for me to be loyal to Trinity and make whatever contribution I could to it. It is the best antidote to egotism and my most enduring lesson in team building and corporate solidarity.

There were of course other valuable lessons I learned in Trinity. They were lessons taught by an outstanding group of teachers who have long been Trinity's strength. Preparing us for the real world that is neither black nor white, they guided us through the deceptive shades of grey. They were teachers for whom the teaching profession was a vocation to which they dedicated their efforts irrespective of the remuneration they received. They helped to build this institution and its great traditions. We need to recreate the conditions under which teachers occupy a venerated place in society. We also need to recognise their role in the economy of the country by paying them much more than we do now. Let me repeat a proposal I have made many times before. Trinity urgently needs an Endowment Fund for Teachers Salaries to which old boys and well-wishers can contribute generously in order that we attract and retain the service so highly qualified and experienced teachers.

Other aspects of my experience at Trinity enriched my life. The tolerance of a Christian missionary school which has a prize for Comparative Religion and allowed the teaching of all religions in the school; the encouragement of Sinhala and Tamil cultural traditions; the fostering of art, music, theatre and Kandyan dancing; the opportunities of playing a variety of sports even if one did not make the school team through Inter-house competitions and set rugby; the wide variety of associations and school societies catering to different interests ranging from farming and astronomy to social service and debating; the school trips to the centers of our ancient civilisation and other places and of course and friendships we enjoyed innocently unmindful of ethnic and religious differences.

But Trinity had its deficiencies too. The overemphasis on the rounded personality, on achieving the Kiplingesque ideal of 'making a man' out of young lads, on an ethos of conformity and on sports as mandatory for 'character-building', was something we inherited from the British public school model.

It led often to a de-emphasis of the academic aspect of the school and, at its worst, a sort of anti-intellectualism.

And so it is not surprising that some old boys of the school get more agitated when Trinity loses the Bradby Shield by a record margin than when our public examination results slump in comparison with other schools.

Various Principals and staff members have battled against these skewed values so that a proper balance can be maintained. Scoring runs on Asgiriya and tries on Bogambara are of course exhilarating but, ultimately, only complementary to high quality value-based academic training dispensed in the classroom, the computer room and in laboratories equipping us all for life, for work, for nation-building and for service to our fellow citizens.

Another problem arises from the fact that Trinity is a fee-levying school and that, barring a few scholarship winners, students owe their presence in the school to the fact that their parents can afford the fees. That should not necessarily convert Trinity into a bastion of privilege in a functioning democracy where equality of opportunity must flourish. Elitism in society can neither be bought nor bequeathed: it must be earned through talent and hard work.

The Trinitian that was produced by this school for several generations was not a snob. He was trained to have an acutely sensitive social conscience; humbled by the privileges he enjoyed and determined to share his good fortune with the less privileged. Those values were fostered by our teachers and through the experience of social service whether through caring for slum dwellers in the Social Service Union dispensary or teaching English to Bogambara prisoners. Frequent interchanges with other schools in Kandy and the rest of the country also helped to breakdown social and economic barriers.

As proof of Trinity's records we have produced a number of outstanding Sri Lankans who have made a huge difference in various walks of life and left an indelible mark in the history of our country. There are many who fill the Trinity Hall of Fame not just for having attained positions of eminence but for having actually made a concrete contribution towards improving the quality of life of our people and leavening the life of our country. Long may their memory live and inspire future generations of Trinitians!

It is now time for me to conclude. I hope this tribute to Trinity repays, even partially, my debt to Trinity for nurturing me and endowing me with a fine education that has been the foundation of my life and career. The school has had a glorious past; it will, I am sure, have a more glorious future.

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