Pinthaliya water for living

An unnoticed but a very important component in the water culture of Sri Lanka is the pinthaliya, the traditional drinking water pot placed and maintained by the communities by the way side in those good olden days. The intention of placing a pinthaliya in a village was to treat water as sacred and valuable. The water was purified by the traditional water pot and people who passed by on the road sides had free access to this pure drinking water to quench their thirst. Naturally that was a way of ensuring preservation of water resources and preventing it from being polluted. Reinstating the usage of the pinthaliya will not only be a way of having safe drinking water, but also a way of reviving the age old pottery industry, which was undermine to import unsafe aluminum utensils. Pinthaliya therefore is identified by Swarna Hansa Foundation as a sustainable indigenous solution to safe drinking water problem.

Thus Project Pinthaliya was added to the "Water for Living" programme which is now being implemented as a trilateral approach to the drinking water problem in Sri Lanka. Swarna Hansa Foundation has encouraged traditional pottery artists to construct pinthali with the intention of reviving this ancient art. Swarna Hansa Foundation distributed 500 pinthali in Colombo South, Galewela, Galgamuwa and Wewniya, in addition to earlier 500 distributed mainly in the Southern coastal areas of Sri Lanka. These were distributed among temples, medical centres, preschools and community centres, taking the message "safe drinking water ensures health".

 
 
 

Dahasak Wew and Dasa Dahasak Ling - 1000 Reservoirs and 10,000 Wells

The Drought and the Famine

Due to destruction and non rehabilitation of the village reservoirs for many years the drought, poverty and hunger began to engulf the country gradually. Since no proper corrective measure was taken today it has become a major obstacle for the holistic development of the country.

Reservoir is the life blood of the village. Reconstruction of reservoirs will;
Restore the foundation for sustainable development
Make available water for thirst and food for hunger
Make available water for cultivation
Foster agricultural and environmental development
Revive indigenous industries

Helping to restore a village reservoir is to help an entire community to overcome their hunger and poverty. Confucius as well as Mao Tse Tung have said "Do not give fish to the people, give them a fishing rod". Likewise in Sri Lanka Swarna Hansa would like to say "Do not give lunch packets or dry rations to the people, instead help them to reconstruct their village reservoirs".

Development is an outcome of the people's way of living, which the people usually speak of as culture. Roots of any form of social development lie in the culture which people practice. The culture of this country is time tested and is believed to last till the sun and moon last. In that sense the endogenous culture of this country can be considered as most modern, for the simple reason of its sustainability.
For the last several decades the culture of this country has been budded and weakened and paving way for an outcome which is alien to the country. Hence the programme of the Swarna Hansa Foundation is to strengthen the endogenous culture while weakening the budded culture. Developing roots therefore is the main intention of the Swarna Hansa Foundation.


Water for living has been identified by the Swarna Hansa Foundation as the single most significant component that needs to be strengthened.
Assisting the villages to reconstruct and rehabilitate ancient wew or reservoirs and construct wells, soon became highly need oriented and very effective, that by the beginning of 2004 both these projects had acquired their identities as Swarna Hansa Dahasak Wew (Swarna Hansa 1000 Reservoirs) and Swarna Hansa Dasa Dahasak Ling (Swarna Hansa 10,000 Wells).


According to the Sri Lankan culture the construction of wewa (reservoir) or a linda (well) is a highly effective way of accumulating merits for oneself as well as conveying merits to others. It is in this understanding that wew (reservoirs) and ling (wells) were constructed in the past. Propagating this message is one purpose of assisting the villagers to reconstruct wew and ling.
During the reconstruction work of the Kimbulkema twin reservoirs in Passaraya, Kataragama, one of the major achievements of the Swarna Hansa Foundation in this exercise was the demonstration of superiority of inherent traditional knowledge and skills of the people with regard to construction of wew. The villagers were able to demonstrate that they possess inherent skills and abilities to construct wew by themselves, without the western engineering knowledge. It was well demonstrated when the villagers found the ancient sluices which are more than 1500 years old when they were trying to install a new sluice for the wewa.

 

Swarna Hansa - the symbol of discernment

Culture itself is the whole way of life of a people. The national culture of this country was developed over a very long period of more than two millennia, based on the judicious utilization of the country's environment with a compulsory accent on preservation rather than exploitation of natural resources. Its factors of production were utilized in harmony with nature so that one generation of people always left the nation's resources for the next generation, the one after that and to infinitum.

The culture - the way of life of the people was almost a sacred one which they believed would ensure the natural resources and whatever benefited the life would last till the sun and moon last.
Preservation of all forms of natural life was practiced with due respect to the environment, so that preservation of national culture itself was the preservation and protection of their life as well the life of future generations. That was the noble but difficult task of the Swarna Hansa Foundation.
In this task the Swarna Hansa Foundation had a small group of committed people who dedicated themselves for the cause.

Adopting a practical method, our strategy was to use every possible contact with people at the local, grassroots, national and international level to convince them of imminent dangers of globalism and paramount importance of preserving their sacred way of living, which was a time tested culture.
Following Swarna Hansa Foundation's two track programme to stop 'undevelopment' and continue with development that will safeguard the national culture and the environment of the country we have been committed to initiate and implement activities that enhances the life of local communities. We have worked to stop the use of pesticides and chemicals that harm the environment and health of people, to stop consumption of tobacco and cigarettes that deteriorate the health and well-being of people, to restore the ancient irrigation system through conserving tanks to enable systematic agriculture and to safeguard the culture and national lifestyle of the people in Sri Lanka.

Who we are…

The Role of Swarna Hansa Foundation
Swarna Hansa Foundation is a Social Development, Non-governmental Organisation established in 1979 to help people in Sri Lanka to engage themselves in a discerned development process.
Swarna Hansa's initiatives majorly focuses on two socioeconomic processes; development and undevelopment.

Tobacco - Undevelopment

Tobacco is an example of the undevelopment process. Prevalence of tobacco is an obstacle for development. Rejecting tobacco saves money and capital, labour and land, health and environment.
Rejecting tobacco is therefore a prerequisite for development.

Water First - Development
Swarna Hansa's major activity in the field of development is redevelopment of water resources in Sri Lanka.
The latest initiative of Swarna Hansa in this field is Dahasak Wew - 1000 reservoirs.

Once Sri Lanka had more than 100,000 village reservoirs scattered all over the country. At that time the country was self sufficient in food, industries and had an exemplary development process. Therefore any sustainable development process in Sri Lanka should again start from rehabilitating the reservoir culture. Because it is indigenous. And will take roots in the land. The objective of the programme Dahasak Wew is to reconstruct 1000 village reservoirs particularly in drought stricken areas of the country.

If you would like to find out more about our projects contact us;

Swarna Hansa Foundation
262,
Densil Kobbekaduwa Mawatha,
Battaramulla,
Sri Lanka. 

Tel: +94 112861981
email: shf@slt.lk, shf262@gmail.com

The Swarna Hansa Foundation is registered as a non-governmental organization at the Division for Non Governmental Organizations in the Ministry of Social Welfare in Sri Lanka and has obtained the Certificate of Registration of Voluntary Social Services / Non Governmental Organizations under Voluntary Social Services Organizations (Registration and Supervision) Act, No: 31 of 1980 as amended by Act, No:8 of 1998.