Extremism should be wiped out: Malwatte Chief Prelate

Tuesday, 13 March 2018 00:23 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Most Ven. Tibbotuwawe Sri Siddharatha Sumangala Mahanayake Thera of the Malwatte Chapter this week said extremism should be totally wiped out from the country. When the Armed Forces and Police are available to protect and safeguard the public, there is no need for other auxiliary Balasenas or Balakayas to offer them protection.

The Prelate said what the Maha Sangha ought to do was to join hands with devotees to develop the village rather than trying to build the country.

“When they build and develop the village, the country as a whole would automatically develop,” the Mahanayake Thera said.

The Prelate, who said that extremist organisations were spreading extremism and creating communal division in the country by openly maintaining offices, emphasised that the Government should pay more attention to this.

The Malwatte Prelate expressed these sentiments when a group of Parliamentarians visiting Kandy, led by Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, called on him at his temple and received his blessings on 10 March.

The Prelate said each and every temple had a devotee village assigned to it. If the Maha Sangha at the temple guided the inhabitants of the village on the correct path, they would be able to uplift the whole nation in keeping with their expectations. The Prelate, who said that Sri Lankans usually had a short memory, added that the recent incidents too may be completely forgotten within a short passage of time.

“They should remember that the country suffered immense setbacks in the past, due to the 30-year-war and incidents like the Black July,” the Malwatte Prelate said. The recent incidents in Kandy not only tainted the country’s image, but could even have an impact on the country’s economy. He said the perpetrators of the recent violence should be identified and brought before the law.

The Most Ven. Wendaruwe Upali Anunayake Thera of the Asgiriya Chapter, delivering an Anusasana to the team led by the Speaker, said the Sinhala Buddhists are a very sensitive group of people. But, some of them had been induced to violent acts by a few extremist groups.

The Anunayake Thera said he highly appreciated the decision taken by Parliamentarians of all political parties and groups to join lands in working out a program to help restore peace in the area, by forgetting petty differences.