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I refer to two very important articles you carried in the Daily News
of January 5, namely, ‘Nalanda, the ancient University’ written by
Sundeep Kumar and the other by Premasara Epasinghe titled ‘Stop inhuman
cattle slaughter’.
The first article by Sundeep Kumar is important particularly for the
students of history for the mass of little-known information presented
about this renowned university of the ancient world, possibly the
firstever residential university of the world.
Writer Epasinghe should be congratulated for the impassioned plea he
makes to the butchers (of cattle) to at least minimise, if not totally
eliminate the brutality taking place in the slaughter of cattle today;
reacting to the public sentiment against this form of killing cattle,
what the beef-eaters are customarily asking is “Why this concern only
for cattle? Don’t the other animals you eat have life?”
Yes, if you can extend that concern to other animals too, that are
being killed for their flesh, it would certainly be very desirable.
But if that is not possible, this plea for minimising the cruelty in
the slaughter of cattle should be easy to understand for any intelligent
person, because man’s relations with cattle, is vastly different to his
relations with any other animals: just one matter - vast number of our
children depend entirely on cow’s milk for their survival and the labour
that man extracts from cattle is immeasurable and invaluable.
M. B. MATHMALUWE –
Matale
The home garden concept is an inborn instinct of the people. It is
the root of agriculture.
Rural people depend on home garden vegetables, fruits and nuts.
Nobody should encourage them, they are self dependent. They don’t wait
for the State to do everything for them. But the urban folk, who are
caught to the contagion of Western civilisation and modern way of life
are far away from home garden projects.
They don’t grow anything in their home gardens except some flower
plants and bushes. It is the duty of the enlightened ones to encourage
the urban folk to grow vegetables, fruits and other trees which give
edibles, to combat the rising Cost of Living than to find faults with
the rulers, whoever it may be.
Throw away your flower plants, grow vegetables in your pots and
gardens. If you have enough water, you can grow any vegetable quite
easily for your table than to go to the market and see stars when you
hear the prices.
Brinjals, ladies fingers, chillies, beans, winged beans, ground nuts,
carrots and many other kinds of vegetables grow everywhere in the
country irrespective of the climate or soil. Start a home vegetable
garden and see the difference.
Schoolchildren should be encouraged to this venture to see good end
results. The use of organic manure too should be encouraged to make this
project a success.
D. M. P. B. DISSANAYAKE –
Kegalle
A concerned pensioner from Kandy has found fault with the Kandy
Divisional Secretary in requesting the pensioners to submit a Life
Certificate from the Grama Niladhari of the area.
I do not think any of the Pension Societies or any sensible pensioner
would endorse the sentiments expressed by him. There had been instances
where the pension payments were fraudulently accepted by interested
parties after the death of the actual pensioners.
There was a case against a certain chief clerk in a pension branch
for misappropriating pension payments of some pensioners who had died. I
wonder is it not common sense that a third party can obtain any payment
from a bank with an ATM Card without placing the signature.
This calling for a Life Certificate is not applicable to the Kandy
Divisional Secretary Division only. I have noticed that all the
pensioners in all other Divisional Secretaries Divisions in the Kandy
District have been informed to comply with this requirement.
It is now clear that this requirement is a directive from the
Director of Pensions. As such, it is not reasonable to find fault with
the Kandy Gangawata Korale Divisional Secretary.
This procedure by the Director of Pensions to ascertain whether the
pensioner is living in the Grama Niladhari who is the closest Government
representative to the individuals concerned has to be accepted by us as
unscrupulous methods are been adopted.
I think it is proper to get the certificate from the Grama Niladhari
rather than JPs and it’s more legal and thereby it would enable Grama
Nialdharis to obtain the statistics of the pensioners of the area.
However, this procedure would have been more appropriate had the
Grama Niladharis been requested to collect these relevant forms and
handover them personally to the Divisional Secretary.
This is only a very minor woe (comparatively not a woe at all) of
pensioners. We have been placed on a salary applicable to 01.01.1997.
It’s 2008 now. Ten years have passed. Unions of Pensioners are on the
move to obtain a more realistic pension in par with the present day
public servants.
The legality of pensioners to be incorporated when amendments to the
Constitution are implemented, the requirement of enroling all pensioners
to Government Public Service Pensioners’ Trust Fund are some of our
present day grievances. I hope it would be more reasonable to clamour on
these grievances.
T. B. EKANAYAKE -
Ampitiya
May I refer to the letter of December 22, 2007 on the above subject
by D. P. Atukorale of Colombo.
He has rightly quoted the incidents in which doctors were involved in
causing ‘terrorism’.
According to my experience, I have found quite a large number of
doctors have been unkind and rude to their patients and the guardians of
the patients. Once I took my wife to a skin specialist for consultation.
While the doctor was examining my wife who was having an itch on her
hands, I just asked him some questions about the disease.
At once the doctor scolded me for asking questions and forced me to
get out of his consultation room. He threatened me with rude words. His
attitude to the patient and the patient’s guardian was terrifying and
unbearable.
In my humble opinion, such doctors should leave the noble medical
profession forthwith. Similarly, some doctors do not diagnose the
patients in Government hospital satisfactorily. Once I took my wife to
the Government hospital to seek treatment of her foot which was injured
by a nail.
The doctor on duty just ignored the case and left the hospital
consultation room as it was time for him to go to his private dispensary
for private practice.
Then, I was compelled to take her to a private doctor for
administering a tetanus injection. Thus, most students shirk off their
duties in the hospital and neglect the treatment of poor patients.
The misbehaviour of a doctor with a female patient in the Negombo
hospital bears testimony to the doctors’ terrorism. Let the prospective
students of medicine be morally trained by their parents, teachers and
lecturers of Medical Faculty.
Above all, doctors should be religiously enlightened and guided
spiritually too by religious dignitaries during their period of medical
course.
M. Y. M. MEEADHU -
Hemmathagama
Many letters were written to the press regarding the deplorable
condition of Kalubowila Canal on Hospital Road, Dehiwela. No action
seems to be coming to date, as ‘passing the buck’ has become the
national pastime of those in authority.
WR’s Dehiwela letter dated December 12, 2007 has hit the nail on the
head. If the canal is not de-silted immediately, there will be no canal
to talk of - only a whole lot of patients suffering from Malaria,
Filaria, Dengue and all mosquito borne diseases.
I hope some local TV station will highlight this awful state of the
canal, because seeing is believing. It is high time the authorities
concerned will take some action before an epidemic breaks out, in
fairness to the rate payers in the area.
C. J. W. -
Dehiwela
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