Distinction in travel journalism
Is independent travel journalism important to you?
Click here to keep it independent

17 Mar, 2015

In Sri Lanka, underworked army runs resorts, shops, salons and travel agencies | The Indian Express

A pristine white building with a classy brown wooden finish overlooks the blue Indian Ocean at Kankensanthurai, about 19 km from Jaffna in northern Sri Lanka. It’s a luxury resort, and on Sunday mornings, families come here for a meal, a swim in the pool, and to play on the beach. Foot-tapping music plays at the restaurant, and DJs are hired for corporate-sponsored parties.

The owner and operator of this beachfront property, called the Thalasevana holiday resort, is the Sri Lankan Army. It is one of the many commercial establishments that the Sri Lankan armed forces — numbering a massive 300,000 uniformed personnel in this small country of about 2 crore — own.

In post-2009 Sri Lanka, this large army has no war left to fight. So it runs resorts, hotels, tea boutiques, snack bars, food stalls, barber salons, travel agencies, farms, and even sells vegetables. Land, including private land, has been acquired for developing for commercial needs. So much so that in 2010, a year after the final defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Ministry of Defence was renamed Ministry of Defence and Urban Development, under the then powerful defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, brother of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Read the rest: In Sri Lanka, underworked army runs resorts, shops, salons and travel agencies | The Indian Express.