2. Voluntary Patrol
During the 1960s, a wave of crime was reported all across Sri Lanka. Housebreakings, murders, bank robberies, and shop burglaries were increasing by the day. Since CCTV cameras did not exist back then, those who committed these burglaries were almost never caught. Many argued that there had to be an organized network behind this surge in crime, as there was no other conceivable reason for such a sudden nationwide outbreak.
Because there was no alternative way to prevent crimes in their own villages, many villagers organized themselves to conduct night patrols along the village roads. Typically, a group of fifteen to twenty young men would gather for these patrols. Since very few people worked outside the village in government or private sector jobs at the time,there were many young people in the village to volunteer for such community work which are exciting as well. A dozen or so youths would assemble around eight o'clock in the evening and patrol until four o'clock the next morning.
To support them, two houses in the village would volunteer to prepare tea at night and, whenever possible, provide food like fish buns. These offers came from the better-off families in the village. Since their homes faced a higher threat from thieves, and because they often had family members working as schoolteachers or clerks in government jobs, these residents assisted with logistics rather than participating in the night patrols themselves. In truth, even if thieves had broken into the homes of most of the young men participating in the patrol, there would have been very little worth taking. Nevertheless, because it was a collective duty and shifts occurred only once every three days, this voluntary night patrol service continued in many villages for several months.
Their enthusiasm for participating stemmed from the camaraderie of gathering late at night ,alongside the fulfilling sense that they were serving their village. Additionally, for some teenagers, this volunteer service was an opportunity to show friends and relatives that they had come of age, as well as a way to internalize that feeling of arriving at adulthood.
I remember someone from our native village visiting our home and recounting an incident related to these night patrols. A mason named Wijey from our village, who was working on a project on an estate near Panwila, left home for work and got off the bus at Wattegama. He visited a local tavern, became thoroughly intoxicated, and missed the last bus. Since there were no three-wheelers or other vehicles in those days, he had to walk to the estate in the dark, carrying a small bag. As he was walking late at night, a night patrol group caught him, mistook him for a thief, and mistakenly beat him to death.
Although that story came from our native village, we lived in a housing scheme near the city. This housing scheme, I would think, was one of the first housing schemes in Sri Lanka. A twelve-acre plot of land formerly belonging to an affluent land owning family had been acquired by the government, subdivided, and offered to government employees at low rates. Small villages bordered two sides of this housing scheme, inhabited mostly by very poor residents. I remember one side was called "Arizona" because a well-known toddy vendor lived there. Why was the word Arizona selected I am not sure, probably because in Sinhala toddy is called Raä Arizona also has prominent r sound in it
Our housing scheme developed quickly. Not everyone who bought a plot moved in right away, but within a year, thirty-two families had settled there. Since all the residents were government employees living in a newly built neighborhood, our families bonded closely. Our fathers joined together to form a welfare association for the housing scheme, and I remember them hosting lively drinking parties every two weeks.
During the height of the crime wave, no thefts occurred within our housing complex; we only heard about such incidents from friends or radio news broadcasts.
At that time, my father worked at the Paddy Marketing Board. As a regional manager, he returned home only for weekends. One day, Nimal Uncle, who lived four houses down from us, paid a visit. Nimal Uncle was perhaps the most popular figure in our housing complex. Always greeting everyone with a warm smile, he was a giant in every sense of the word. Standing over six feet tall, his arms and legs were built proportionally large and broad. He also had a prominent, protruding belly to match his stature, and behind his back, we called him "The Giant"—likely inspired by the giant character from the Mihira children's paper,comic strips of that era.
He had come to meet my father. I was sitting on the living room floor reading the Sunday Rivirasa newspaper, which allowed me to overhear their conversation. After exchanging pleasantries, Nimal Uncle gradually steered the conversation toward the general security of our housing scheme. Listening in while pretending to read the paper, I could tell from his tone and enthusiasm that discussing this was his primary reason for coming over to our house today.
"Look here, Mr. Weerasinghe," Nimal Uncle said. "Over the past few months, people in villages across Sri Lanka have been taking their security very seriously, yet we haven't paid it any mind. As government employees, we ought to set an example, but we've just been idling by. We haven't even brought it up at our association meetings. The idea came to me on the bus ride back to Kandy from Laggala this evening. We, who should be setting a standard for rural communities across the country, have been acting like children instead."
I noticed this thought deeply affected my father, making him feel embarrassed. His embarrassment stemmed largely from the fact that he was the only person in the housing scheme with any military training—training he had acquired as an officer in the Cadet Corps. Beyond his role as a school principal, he had served as a lieutenant in the Cadet Corps, before joining the paddy marketing board that was created a few years back.
"We must hold a meeting about this tomorrow," Nimal Uncle continued. "As educated individuals, we can demonstrate to others how systematically a village security program can be managed. Besides, it will relieve us of the guilt of neglecting our responsibility."
My father agreed wholeheartedly. They decided to hold the association meeting the following morning at ten o'clock rather than in the evening as usual, before parting ways. My father immediately set out to phone the households that had landlines to inform them about the gathering. Telephones were so rare those days, the percentage would have been like 10%. I was tasked with delivering the message to the remaining homes without phones, specifically those located on the upper section of the road. Another boy likely handled the massage to lower section.
The meeting took place the following morning at our home, just as Nimal Uncle and my father had planned. When explaining the security plan to the gathering, Nimal Uncle indirectly credited my father with the idea for this security program without stating it outright. As he highlighted my father's military background, I watched my parents' faces beam with pride. Hearing this filled me with a touch of pride as well. Since I didn't excel at sports like cricket like some others, I thought this might finally earn me some recognition among my peers in the neighborhood.
Tea was prepared at our home for the twenty-five or so attendees, while Nimal Uncle brought fish buns.
The group unanimously decided to launch the security program that very evening. They agreed that two four-man teams would patrol the loop road from 10:00 PM to 5:00 AM. Rough sketches were drawn to mark the starting points and designated locations for each team at various hours. The first team would end its shift at 3:00 AM, at which point the second team would take over until 5:00 AM. Since my father was part of the first night patrol team, I walked the initial lap with them before returning home around 10:00 PM. Stepping onto the veranda, I watched my father and the other guards march down the road like a squad of soldiers in training, feeling immense pride. I could faintly hear the marching drum from ‘The Longest Day’ movie we watched in the movie theatre recently.
The night patrols continued like this for a week. However, as often happens with volunteer efforts, I watched the enthusiasm gradually wane. The absence of a genuine threat or necessity for such a security apparatus seemed to be the main reason for its decline.
At the end of that week, Nimal Uncle and his family—he had a son and a daughter—had to move to Colombo due to a job transfer. My father kept the voluntary security program going for another week, but it eventually died a natural death. A few months later, Nimal Uncle's house was sold, and none of us ever saw him again. I once overheard my father telling my mother that Nimal Uncle hadn't moved to Colombo because of a transfer, but because he had resigned from his job, though I didn't pay much attention to it at the time.
This entire episode resurfaced in my memory nearly twenty-five years later. After earning my science degree, I worked as a schoolteacher for about three years. After deciding I needed a better-paying job, I began browsing newspaper advertisements and applying for various positions. Eventually, I was selected as a manager at a company that imported industrial chemicals and distributed them across Sri Lanka. Although the workplace was in Colombo, a house near the factory was provided, which made the offer particularly appealing to me.
After working there for a few months, I grew very fond of the job. The young owner of the company was close to my age. After studying at a university in Australia and working briefly at a gold mine there, he had returned to Sri Lanka following his father's death to run the family business. The owner every year hosted an annual year-end party at his residence for executive-level officers, which fell on December 17th that year.
Around 6:00 PM, seven of us arrived at the owner's residence in Rajagiriya. It was a luxurious and artistically designed home. The owner mentioned to me that evening that his father had purchased the property many years ago from a cousin of a former prime minister of our country. Featuring a small bar in the center of the living room and opening onto a lawn that sloped down to the edge of a lake, the home's most captivating feature for me was a mature nam-nam tree laden with fruit along its trunk.
Arriving slightly earlier than the others gave me time to stroll through the garden. Once the rest of the guests arrived and we moved inside, we spent time examining several photographs hanging along the long veranda, as one naturally does when visiting a house.
When I looked at the second photograph on the wall, a memory from my past suddenly flashed before me: the week-long security patrol in our housing scheme. To my astonishment, that second photo was a grand, commanding black-and-white portrait of Nimal Uncle, the man who had spearheaded it all. A short while later, when our employer walked over, I mentioned this to him. He was equally amazed. Though somewhat younger than me, he still remembered my father and me. From that moment on, our friendship deepened, and he began treating me more like a friend than an employee. Through various conversations, he revealed that while his father was working in Laggala, he had come into possession of a bag of gemstones. His father subsequently quit his job, moved to Colombo, bought this business, and successfully expanded it to build their life.
I relayed this entire story to my father over the phone, and he was deeply amused.
When I visited home a few weeks later, we talked at length about it. As soon as I mentioned the detail about the bag of gemstones, my father burst into loud laughter.
"That man led us in circles for an entire week!" my father chuckled. "The week he tightened security in the housing scheme was the exact week he was keeping that bag of gemstones at home before selling it! What a brilliant mind!"
He let out a hearty laugh before adding, "Don't go bringing this up with anyone else now—why dig up the past? If your mother were still here, I'd be getting a earful right now. She always used to say how easily I get taken in by people."
