By Jehan Perera –

Jehan Perera

The government has come under critical scrutiny regarding its commitment to constitutional reform with ministers of the government claiming it is not a government priority. The opposition is taking the government to task on yet another election time promise that might not be delivered. These have been and continue to be the challenges that have prevented Sri Lanka from reaching its full potential. Constitutional reform is one of these. Added to this have been the persistence of social and economic inequalities that continue to marginalise communities at the bottom of the social hierarchy.

One of the most scarring examples of such injustice is the experience of the Malaiyaha Tamil community. The scale of the original exclusion is worth understanding clearly. According to the 1946 Census, the Malaiyaha Tamil community numbered approximately 780,600 persons and constituted 11.73 percent of the country’s population making them the second largest ethnic community, larger than the Sri Lankan Tamil community who numbered 733,700 or 11.02 percent of the population at the time. The denial of citizenship and voting rights to the Malaiyaha Tamil community was the first major injustice inflicted on an ethnic minority in post-independence Sri Lanka. The consequences have been cruel and long-lasting. A community that had contributed enormously to the country’s economy through its labour on the plantations was excluded from political participation and denied basic rights.

The discriminatory and callous treatment of the Malaiyaha Tamil people was a political and moral failure that has cast a cruel shadow over the country’s post-independence history. Responsibility for that injustice needs to be shared widely. Political leaders across ethnic lines, some seen as giants to this day, who either deliberately connived in it or failed to resist it. The result was the marginalisation of a community whose contribution to national prosperity far exceeded the recognition it received. Today, nearly eight decades later, and in the shadow of the resettlement that the Ditwah cyclone has made necessary, Sri Lanka has an opportunity to correct that historic wrong but only if economic reform is matched by genuine social inclusion.

Longstanding Grievances

The NPP government has repeatedly acknowledged the need to address the longstanding grievances of the Malaiyaha Tamil people. In its election manifesto, the NPP pledged to improve living conditions in plantation areas, strengthen land and housing rights, ensure equal access to education and public services, and integrate plantation communities more fully into national development. The NPP’s Nuwara Eliya Declaration of 2023 similarly recognised that the plantation community had suffered generations of exclusion and promised measures to address disparities in housing, land ownership, infrastructure, education and economic opportunity. The need for such action is plain to see. While citizenship issues have largely been resolved over time, the socio-economic consequences of decades of exclusion remain deeply entrenched and continue to shape daily life in plantation communities. A conference organized by the Institute of Social Development to mark International Tea Day on May 21 at the BMICH brought out this and many other salient issues. Headed by P Muthulingam the organization has advocated for the rights of the Malaiyaha Tamil people for the past 35 years to be equal citizens who enjoy social and economic justice.

The central problem facing many plantation workers is the low level of income they receive. Daily wages remain among the lowest in the country relative to the difficulty and intensity of the work. Plantation labour continues to depend heavily on methods that have changed little over generations. Productivity remains low compared to competing tea-producing countries not because workers lack capability, but because sustained investment in their welfare, skills and economic mobility has been withheld. Workers consequently remain trapped in a cycle of low wages and limited economic mobility. Their housing situation compounds these difficulties. Many plantation families continue to live in housing owned either by plantation companies or the state. Lack of secure ownership limits their ability to accumulate assets, access credit or make independent decisions regarding their future. When Cyclone Ditwah damaged plantation housing, it exposed the inability of those living in that housing to access state compensation as they did not own the housing in which they lived.

The problems extend beyond the central highlands. Plantation workers living in private estates and smallholdings in other parts of the country face similar challenges. A recent Amnesty International report documented serious abuses affecting Malaiyaha Tamil workers in private tea estates in the Southern Province. These include wage withholding, debt dependency, restrictions on movement and intimidation and practices the report argued correspond to internationally recognised indicators of forced labour. These findings are not peripheral. They reveal that the structural exclusion of the Malaiyaha Tamil community is not a relic of the past but an active, ongoing condition. Economic vulnerability and social marginalisation continue to leave many plantation workers without effective protection or access to justice. It is against this backdrop that the government’s recent plantation reform initiative assumes special significance.

Second Phase

The government has announced the second phase of a programme to make underutilised plantation lands and assets available for investment. The objective is to transform underperforming assets into productive enterprises capable of generating employment, attracting investment and revitalising regional economies. The programme seeks to modernise the plantation sector, improve productivity and create new opportunities in tourism, renewable energy and export-oriented industries. These objectives are necessary and welcome. However, economic reform alone will not be sufficient and Sri Lanka’s own history provides the warning. Previous rounds of plantation modernisation pursued productivity gains without addressing the structural disempowerment of the people at the centre of the industry. The result was investment that generated wealth without distributing it. The workers who produced the wealth were once again treated as labour inputs rather than as beneficiaries. If the current reform follows the same logic, it risks reproducing the same failure.

For reform to succeed, plantation workers must be recognised not merely as a labour force but as stakeholders with rights, aspirations and a legitimate claim to share in the benefits of development. Housing ownership, secure land tenure, quality education, vocational training and entrepreneurship need to be built into the reform process from the outset. The government’s commitments to the Malaiyaha Tamil community therefore need to be incorporated into every stage of the reform process. On the contentious question of land, the government should consider establishing an independent national land commission. Such a body should include respected government officials, professionals and representatives from all ethnic and religious communities. It should review land policy comprehensively, develop transparent principles for allocation and use, ensure fairness in decision making and provide a trusted mechanism for resolving disputes. A credible land commission would help build public confidence that land reforms are being undertaken in the national interest rather than for the benefit of particular groups.

The correction of historic injustices should not be viewed as a concession to one community. It should be understood as an investment in national unity, because societies do not become stronger by maintaining the exclusion of those they have wronged. On the contrary, they become stronger by ending it. The first great injustice committed against an ethnic minority after independence cannot be undone. But its consequences can be addressed, and doing so would strengthen reconciliation, enhance social cohesion and bring Sri Lanka closer to the vision of a country in which all communities live with equal dignity and equal hope. This is what the Vesak messages of the President and Prime Minister promised. The plantation reform now underway alongside the resettlement that the Ditwah cyclone has made necessary, is the moment to make good on that promise in sustained policy that endures beyond any single government which is what constitutional change is about.