The town of Gampola in Sri Lanka’s Kandy district houses a 100-year-old structure comprising five “line rooms”—each windowless square, just ten by 12 feet in size, was once home to an entire family of estate workers. Though elsewhere people still live in such cramped accommodations, this particular row of rooms has been turned into … Continue reading
Edward de Alwis was admitted as a 14-year-old to the Hendala Leprosy Hospital. He has been a patient there for some 75 years. [Smriti Daniel/ Al Jazeera] Hendala, Sri Lanka – Edward de Alwis was born in 1928, the youngest of nine siblings. He was only 14-years old when a Public Health Inspector on a … Continue reading
Sri Lankan activists will tell you that the island has a commission culture. In the last 15 years alone, people have stood up and testified before dozens of committees – some, such as the Udalagama Commission, investigating human rights abuses, and others, such as the Mahanama Tilakaratne and Paranagama Commissions, looking into abductions and … Continue reading
Less than a decade after the end of the war, Colombo’s skyline has undergone a rapid transformation. Across the city, high-rise complexes have sprung up, and are billed as the practical solution to a housing crisis affecting the city’s working poor. The names of these towering structures – Methsara Uyana, Lakmuthu Sevana and Sirisara Uyana … Continue reading
When Ahilan Arulanantham heard that the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation had named him a recipient of the $625,000 “Genius Grant,” one of the first things he thought about was how much he would like to spend some of it on supporting human rights work in Sri Lanka. Since the announcement was made … Continue reading
Since 2014, Hasanah Cegu Isadeen has met with and interviewed some 700 Sri Lankan Muslim women. A lawyer, independent researcher and activist, Cegu is haunted by the stories she has heard. She has met women who were married as young as 12 and forced into sex by their adult partners before they had even attained … Continue reading
Let me begin with this apartment, where a grocery store and six people are all crammed into 400 square feet in the Methsara Uyana high-rise. The people fit themselves around the groceries, which occupy all of the living room and most of the kitchen. Sleeping arrangements are flexible, and visitors and wet laundry must both … Continue reading
