Ragging – then and now

At a TV discussion recently, the Vice Chancellor of Ruhuna University spoke about ragging, which made me recall our days in Peradeniya Campus. 

It was June 1953. The first batch of freshers was taking residence in Peradeniya. I was also in that batch. It was not my first visit to the campus as I had earlier gone for the viva. Accompanying me for the viva was Gune (H.D.C. Gunasekera), a close friend at Ananda College who had gained direct admission. 

Most of our school friends were already in Peradeniya.  So there was good company when I went for the interview – yet we had to expect being ragged. Wearing a white suit with tie meant I could easily be identified. 

My friend Sira (B.A. Siriwardena – renowned journalist in later years) accompanied me to the Senate building where the interviews were held. My interview was over before noon. He wanted us to be his guests at lunch at the Arunachalam Hall where he resided. 

“No way,” I said. I was scared of being ragged.

“Don’t be a fool. Give me your coat, pull out your tie and put it in your trouser pocket,” he told me in colloquial Sinhala. 

We sat with the others for lunch. Several other Anandians came and chatted with us. We felt quite at home. Sira obviously was quite popular and no one dared mess around with us, we thought.

Once the final list of admissions was released, those selected were asked to come a few days before the seniors so that they could be acclimatised to the new environment. I was in the list and got a place at Jayatilaka Hall – named after renowned statesman Sir Baron Jayatilaka. 

My roommate – tall, well-built J. Kotelawela (Kote) looked quite elderly. An Anandian himself but senior to us, he had decided to do his degree after finishing the diploma course at the School of Agriculture, Kundasale. In fact, he had quit his job as an agricultural instructor to join the university. A fatherly figure, he was excellent company. He was by then married to Elsie, a teacher and herself a graduate.

No sooner the seniors started coming in, than we became jittery that we would be ragged. When I saw the big, burly G.T. Wickremasinghe, a friend at Ananda, among the seniors, I felt ‘safe’. He was also the Hall Society President and naturally was going to ‘manage’ the rag. 

He quietly took me to a side and told me, “I am not going to show that I know you. Don’t worry. I will see that you will not be harassed.” I was relieved. 

The seniors treated us as strangers in the first few days. In the first week we were ordered to wear coat and tie for lectures – the coat to be worn the other way round. It was uncomfortable but we had no choice. 

When we went for lectures we found gangs from other halls waiting to rag us. “Raise the right trouser leg up to the knee,” one guy shouted. We obeyed his orders. “Take this flower and go and look for the most beautiful girl, kneel down and give the flower to her,” another shouted. No choice but to go. Not too bad, I thought. 

The lectures started. Numbers being large, the economics lectures were in Room A, the largest hall. A Nalandian, Justin Jayasuriya (who joined the Navy and is now a retired Rear Admiral) and I became pals and we sat together in the last row. 

Our first experience as undergrads was an economics lecture by a visiting lecturer, one Eiteman from America. We found it a bit difficult to follow his pronunciation. He started telling us about “the man and supply” and we wrote down what we heard.  When he mentioned these words a few times I thought something was not quite right. I turned to Justin and he too had written the same. It took us a while to realise he was talking about “demand and supply”!

The Hall rag was fixed for one particular night. A few of us were asked to be in one room for the “ragging gang” led by my friend GT. In all seriousness he asked my name, which school I came from and other odd questions, ridiculing me at each answer while the others had a hearty laugh. He acted so well, as if he had never seen me before. (In fact, he was picked by the Austrian dramatist Newman Jubal, who had come to Peradeniya on invitation, to play the lead role of ‘Veda Hatana’ which GT did to perfection.) 

I was asked to get on the bed, imagine it was a swimming pool and dive. I managed without getting injured. Then I had to sing a song after which I was released. Those who challenged or refused to obey their orders were “bucketed” in the middle of the night. A few got ducked at the Shirley de Alwis pond as punishment for resisting the ragging. All in all we found it to be “a decent rag”.

Everything was back to normal after a week. Freshers were brought in to the teams to play netball at Hilda Obeysekera and Sangamitta Halls for the “honourable seniors” to try and get to know the nice-looking female freshers. 

Our warden was the Professor of Classics, J.L.C. Rodrigo. The Western-oriented professor used to come in the evening dressed in full suit, seated in the back seat of his Jowett Javelin car – a rather exclusive brand when most other lecturers drove their Volkswagen Beetles.  He met the senior sub-warden Dr. S. Vithiananthan (he was to become the first Vice-Chancellor of the University of Jaffna) and sub-warden Dr. Jotiya Dhirasekera (later the Venerable Dhammavihari) who attended to routine student matters like issuing exeats giving permission to be out past 10 p.m. 

Food was the main thing we complained about. I remember the “soup parade” one evening when Prof. Rodrigo had come. Later we realised the caterer Mr. Suwaris was doing his best.

We had to wear shirt and longs for our meals. My roommate Kote started coming down for dinner in what resembled a national dress – white baniyan and sarong. There was no objection and we soon followed with something similar to what he wore.

After some time Prof. Rodrigo moved out and Professor G.P. Malalasekara took over as warden. The simple man he was, he would come in the evening driving his Beetle, park and then come and sit on the steps. 

“Kiyanawako thamuselage prashna (Tell me your problems),” he would tell us. We had hardly any problems to discuss with him. We felt so friendly – just like the warden in the opposite Arunachalam Hall, Professor D.E. Hettiarachchi.

(More next week)