Minister of Mineral Oil Resources Development Duminda Dissanayake assured the residents of Tantirimale, who have been engaged in a continuing public protest over the poor state of the 26 kilometer stretch of road from Vannihelambewa junction Anuradhapura to Bogoda, Tantirimale being in a state of disrepair, that the government would take immediate steps to start its rehabilitation.
The Maha Sangha too had joined the protest on Saturday (26).
The road from Vannihelambewa Junction, Anuradhapura has been in a badly neglected state from 1994 and the public in the villages of the area launched a protest by placing logs across the road and planting banana trees in the middle of the road where the tar had been washed off.
Traffic on the road came to a halt for over thirty hours with the protestors blocking the road and the Maha Sangha including the Chief Incumbent of Tantirimale Raja Maha Viharaya Ven. Tantrirmale Chandaratana Nayake Thera joining the protest. The Minister, who met the protestors, pledged before the Maha Sangha that the rehabilitation of the road would commence from May 15.
The major irrigation reservoir, the Maha Villachchiya Mahavewa, is in the danger of destruction as its dam was damaged during the recent rains that fell on the North Central Province. About 5,000 farmer families, who depend solely on the waters of this major reservoir, with a capacity of 23,000 acre feet of water, to irrigate their rice and other crops will be affected if the dam is not repaired immediately farmers told The Island.
About 3,000 acres of paddy are cultivated by the farmers of the Maha Villachchiya area with irrigation from the reservoir. When the reservoir was first rehabilitated, 888 farmer families were settled in the lands below it but today after four generations the number of families had increased to 5,000,
At present about 500 metres of the bund of the reservoir has been damaged by erosion and the threat of the bund being breached badly was pointed out in the press several times before, but the irrigation authorities have not taken steps to repair it.
However, when the local authorities were contacted for a comment they said there was no immediate danger of the dam breaching right now. But the water level of the reservoir had reached spill level with the recent rains. The senior farmers and settlers expressed fears of the worst to come if the dam is not repaired now.
Tantirimale is situated in Mahavilachchiya Divisional Secretariat Division. Read this article about Tantirimale in Sinhala Wikipedia. This article was compiled by Sunil Premarathna, a former student of Horizon Lanka, now a final year student at University of Colombo. Sunil Premarathna is also doing his thesis on Mahavilachchiya reservoir and its irrigation system these days.
The late Minister of Highways & Road Development Mr Jeyaraj Fernandopulle visited Horizon Lanka, Mahavilachchiya in October, 2006. He was greatly impressed about Horizon Lanka’s mission on developing the village with the use of ICT and asked how best he could help Horizon Lanka. The staff, students and the parents requested him to repair the roads in and around Mahavilachchiya as it is the most needed requirement for the village. He immediately instructed local authorities to repair the road up to Horizon Lanka. He was in the process of repairing other roads in Mahavilachchiya, including repairing the road from Nochchiyagama via Suriyadamana to Mahavilachchiya since this could make easy access for Mahavilachchiya’s agricultural products to Nochchiyagama and Thambutthegama markets. Mr Fernandopulle was also willing to extend the carpeted road from Anuradhapura to Oyamaduwa up to Mahavilachchiya. We are not sure if the project would go forward with his untimely demise.
This story was originally written and uploaded to Horizon Lanka website on Octiber 09, 2006.
Road to Mahavilachchiya is in very good condition only upto Oyamaduwa Junction. But beyond that the work has not been done well. Recently Minister of Highways Hon. Jeyaraj Fernandopulle and the Deputy Minister Hon. W. B. Ekanayake visited Mahavilachchiya to see the road conditions. They also visited Horizon Lanka Foundation. We hope that the roads in Mahavilachchiya will be repaired soon as it would encourage investors to start ICT related ventures in Mahavilachchiya.
Sirasa TV won the award for the best news reporting at the State Tele Awards for the news item it did on Mahavilachchiya’s mesh internet project. Yasarath Kamalsiri was the producer of the news item. The award ceremony was held at BMICH, Colombo yesterday (March 17, 2008.)
You can watch the news item on YouTube by clicking this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rt1ZdfQVp7E The video clip of the news item which was uploaded to YouTube has drawn more than 30,000 hits.
Tigo has extended its mobile coverage up to Elayapattuwa. Elayapattuwa is a small town between Anuradhapura and Mahavilachchiya. Tigo is yet to cover Mahavilachchiya.
Hutch has installed a tower in Mahavilachchiya to provide mobile coverage. The tower installation is almost over and the people hope the coverage will be available very soon.
Sri Lanka Telecom has installed a tower in Pemaduwa, Mahavilachchiya to provide mobitel mobile phone coverage to Mahavilachchiya. Work of the tower is almost over and the coverage will be given very soon. Mahavilachchiya already has Lankabell CDMA coverage and Dialog mobile and CDMA coverage. Dialog recently covered Tantirimale as well.
This courageous blind couple, Baby Nona and Punchi Banda lives in Mannar Junction, Mahavilachchiya. So, What is special about them? Well, they didn’t simply resorted to begging as the other disabled people do to make their living. Being blind by birth, both of them decided to deviate from begging and started selling coconut as their living. One can see them carrying heavy bags of coconuts on their heads on the roads in Mahavilachchiya. As they don’t have a vehicle for this, they have to do this tiresome business in the scorching sun. But for them, it is much better than going begging and becoming a nuisance to the villagers. Read the rest of this entry »
This is a map of Mahavilachchiya. Mahavilachchiya village is located 40 Kilometers away from Anuradhapura city. The village is surrounded by the Vilpattu national park. The even land stretches unto water reservoirs small and large including the Mahavilachchiya tank, one of the biggest in Sri Lanka. The flat fertile land provides the population every thing since farming is the livelihood of the most of the people here.
1. Title: - A Survey on the kinds of traditional Ayurvedha herbal medicine treatments that could be offered in a Horizon-linked health tourism area Read the rest of this entry »
Mesh networking comprises of a series of smart digital routers (Meshboxes) designed to carry high performance wireless internet over a wide area. Mesh networking is unique because instead of having a central server which determines how data is passed between computers, the mesh creates a network of equals, so individual computers find the best way to communicate with each other. All the computers are connected together to form a resilient network in such a way that the more devices there are on a network, the more routes there are through it. It can grow organically and will automatically organize itself. The ad hoc nature of the mesh makes it easy to start small and expand where necessary, without the complex reprogramming involved with adding to a traditional, top-down network. If one node were to fail, the network will automatically redirect data through an alternative route. Read the rest of this entry »
Due to heavy rains Mahavilachchiya is receiving the Mahavilachchiya reservoir is spilling these days. Farmers in Mahavilachchiya are very happy about the rains since they are sure of cultivating two seasons next year.
By Majith Rakshitha Perera - Former student of Horizon Lanka
I am Majith Rakshitha Perera from Mahavilachchiya. I have long history with Horizon Lanka Foundation. I joined Horizon when I was studying in grade seven. Now I am 20 years old. I got good experiences from the Horizon Lanka. I haven’t got paper qualifications (certificates) for my computer knowledge. But I have knowledge than people with certificates. I know basic computer networking and computer hardware. I can learn any software very fast. Read the rest of this entry »
“Aruni Pradeepika has a post about the abduction of her father - farmer in Mahavilachchiya. Perhaps the first in the Sri Lankan blogosphere. The title “My Father” seems to have gone unnoticed in kottu.org feed. There are no comments on her blog about it (what can one say?). What is not clear from the post is whether it was an attempted abduction or a successful one. [Mahavilachhciya Blog editor's note: The girl's father was abducted and he has even shouted that he is being abducted to other farmers.]
I am Kamal Deshapriya Dissanayaka. I am 20 years old. I studied at St/ Joseph’s college Anuradhapura. I sat for the AL examination in 2006. I am a commerce student. While I am doing the AL, I had joined with Horizon Lanka. Through Horizon Lanka I could improve my English and computer knowledge well. First of all, I must thank Mr. Nandasiri Wanninayaka. Always he gave valuable advices to me. Actually, I can never forget that. Because of Mr. Nandasiri Wanninayaka I could get an opportunity to work in Microimage.
We had an interview on 22nd May 2007 at Microimage. For this interview seven members came from Horizon Lanka. After the interview, I was selected. I was very happy about that. That is a very special moment in my life. Because of Horizon Lanka now I am working in Microimage. Because of Horizon Lanka a lot of youth in Mahavilachchiya get good computer and English knowledge. I think Horizon Lanka is a real bonus for Mahavilachchiya people. Now everyone knows about importance of Horizon Lanka. Now many Sri Lankans and the world know about this Mahavilachchiya. Actually, I am proud of that.
Kamal Deshapriya Dissanayaka
(A Former Student of Horizon Lanka)
"The mission of Horizon Lanka Foundation is empowering the rural community through enhanced ICT awareness while preserving its hallowed traditions and cultural values, by utilising the unique infrastructural resources available at Mahavilachchiya optimally, constituting a pioneer level testing ground and launching pad for innovative technologies, widening avenues of employment for the rural youth through expansion of Business Process Outsourcing opportunities and facilitating mastery of English language, and serving as a model to be emulated by emerging eVillages in Sri Lanka."
VOLUNTEER AT HORIZON LANKA, MAHAVILACHCHIYA, SRI LANKA
We welcome foreign volunteers to Horizon Lanka. Those who prefer to volunteer at Horizon Lanka Academy, Mahavilachchiya can contact Global Vision International's volunteer scheme to Horizon Lanka. If you can teach English, computers, management, etc., you can contact us and GVI for that. You can read some of the tour reports by our former volunteers in this page. Visit http://www.horizonlanka.org/volunteer/index.htm for more details
