I met several men and women who sought assistance in locating their missing kith and kin....!!!

May minds be cleared soon
Spirit of voluntarism:

I had heard the rest of the world call them Internally Displaced Persons or IDPs. But not Supem de Silva, the lead volunteer coordinator of the Rotary Club’s effort at the Arunachalam Transitional village’s sections A, B and C. I was taken by his use of the nomenclature of Internally Displaced Sri Lankans or IDSLs to describe our brethren in the camps. Such focus I thought, augers well for our future, where we need to identify, own and seek solutions to our issues by ourselves.

I appreciated that Supem had identified the need for us to recognize and own both the problem and the solution. He had realized that this was critical if we were to have lasting peace in our country, with conflict and terror never, ever raising its ugly head again.


IDPs engaged in reconstruction. Picture by Chaminda Hiththetiya

He together with his wife Eshani, had left their three little children, with his mother-in-law to leave Colombo at 3 a.m. that morning to reach Chettikulum in time to meet his other colleagues who had already arrived.

Having begun these visits in April, this perhaps is his eighth or ninth weekly visit to coordinate the work that the Rotarians were doing here in sections A, B and C. Other Rotarian who joined him on this visit was Senaka Kotagma, an exporter of tea, when away from the voluntary effort supporting the IDSLs.

We also had with us Stanley Obeysekera, who joined in as a volunteer observing the needs with a view of supporting future efforts.

For medical doctors, Ajith Amarasinghe, Suranga Ranasinghe, Nilupul Perera and Anil Weerasinghe, the visit that originated in Colombo at 2 a.m. was indeed no fun run. After a hard day’s work in a leading private hospital in the city, they drove with Rotary Club’s President- elect Hiran de Silva.

Dealing with the many
Sections A, B and C under their charge is at the far end of the Zone 3 village and houses families with children, the disabled, elderly and expectant mothers in the main.

There are 4,000 persons in over 400 tents and it was established since April this year in a well planned manner. But with the sudden inflow of IDSLs in mid May, the tents had to be occupied by more than the desired numbers.

The doctors, saw the enormity of the task before them in identifying the manifold problems faced by the people in the three sections and seeking adequate solutions for them. True, there is a Grama Niladhari appointed to each section.

But with inadequacy of water supply, toilets and other basic facilities in the early days, the task faced by each of them had been insurmountable. To add to this situation, until a little over a month ago, most in the camps had viewed outside volunteers with suspicion and doubt.

With the doctors providing initial care and medicine at the several clinics, they were able to win some level of confidence that gave them a way ahead to seek involvement of the people in setting up self-help initiatives.

Interactive solutions
With Dr. Suranjith’s experience and training as a community medicine specialist and the assistance of the Grama Niladhari, they began appointing a volunteer leader for a cluster of 10 tents.

The task of the leader was to visit each tent and record in Tamil in an exercise book provided for him, all details of the families and their needs such as the health status, clothing needs, food and nutritional status, displacement from other family members, special needs of children, pregnant mothers, disabled and the elderly.

Each week, the doctors would sit around on a mat with the volunteer leaders and have an interactive discussion (with the help of interpreters found from within the leaders) to identify and prioritize the most urgent issues.

At the sessions I observed last week, there was discussion on the need for more toilets and for a scheme for them to be operated under supervision of the leaders to ensure cleanliness.

To establish study centres with adequate electric lighting in the night, seek permission to extend the tents with pol athu shelters, the poor segment wanted to seek work within the camp for wages to enable them to buy additional items of food and other needs from the Sathosa Cooperative Shop established within the Zone 3 camp site were the other identified issues.

They also wanted to begin cultivating maize, manioc and spinach plants around their tents and sought a supply of mammoties and other basic implements for that purpose.

No false hopes
When I walked around, I met several men and women who sought assistance in locating their missing kith and kin.

I was advised earlier that we as volunteers should not make promises or give hope where we did not have the ability to assist with a degree of certainty. The doctors were collecting information through the appointed volunteer leaders on this aspect to present them to the appropriate authority to assist in the process of locating them.

A significant observation I made while at the Arunachalam transitional village was that everyone there from the assigned volunteer organizations were performing useful functions.

The school area at the edge of the Zone was operational even at 4.00 p.m. A few weeks ago, a vocational training centre had been set up where wood work, carpentry, welding and computer training is provided on six months NDT certificate level courses.

A Kovil for worship was to be available from this week set up by the Rotary volunteers. Setting up of a Christian Church is also on the pipeline, a barber shop (run by an IDSL) has set up business and was already active.

A library with Tamil and English books is to be set up soon and several TV sets are to be installed.

Discussed and resolved at last week’s meeting, a home-grown solution has been found to counter the problem of flies that were breeding in the garbage disposal pits.

This week they were covering it with the ash from the cooking area. An idea suggested by a volunteer leader at the interactive session.

Mending hearts and minds
All is not certainly well at Sections A, B and C of the Arunachalam Transitional Village or Zone 3 of the Menik Farm IDSL Camp. But what I observed encouraged me immensely and gave me a renewed sense of faith in the spirit of voluntarism and the level of commitment our young demonstrate, in working towards healing our wounds and mending our hearts.

May the minds be cleared, while the process of clearing the mines goes fast forward to ensure safety, security and the well-being of all sons and daughters of Mother Sri Lanka.

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