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Prof. C. Dharmawardena on Colonization Schemes

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Courtesy :  https://thuppahis.com/2021/05/31/addressing-a-criticism-of-ds-senananyakes-dry-zone-colonization-schemes/ Addressing A Criticism of DS Senanayake’s Dry Zone Colonization Schemes Chandre Dharmawardana,  28 May 2021, with this title  “Criticism of D.S. Senanayake’s Dry Zone colonization schemes” Would Sri Lanka have been better off if not for the fetishization of rural peasant life and its connexion to the Sinhalese Buddhist nation-myth? Why do people talk of “colonization schemes” when a government  facing bulging population growth, for one reason or another, opens up land for its people to settle? When the US West was opened by colonizing (in the proper sense of the term)  the indigenous (“red Indian”) lands by out-right massacre followed by land grab, the word colonization was/is not used by western historians, where as they should indeed use that word. But where Sri Lankan writers use the word colonization, no colonization took place. The ince...
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Gal Oya Valley Scheme & the People Who Made It a Reality

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The Gal Oya Valley Scheme & the People who made it a Reality KK De Silva,  who was an employee of the RVDB from 1967-1979 Courtesy : https://thuppahis.com/2022/05/20/the-galoya-valley-scheme-the-people-who-made-it-a-reality/ May 20, 2022 3.00 pm Introduction   Sir James Emerson Tennent, Colonial Secretary from 1845 to 1850, at page 432 of his book,  Account of the Island of Ceylon … .. Vol. II says that on a visit to the Horra-bora Tank (Soraborawewa ), then in ruins, he was so impressed with its magnificence & potential for rice cultivation that after subsequent inspections of other ancient tanks in the Northern Division , he proposed in 1848 that measures be taken to restore important ancient reservoirs by legislative action; his proposal was approved, but action delayed due to unavoidable circumstances, possibly the 1848 uprising, & legislation was introduced later, when Sir Henry Ward was Governor, by way of the Irrigation Ord...
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