South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies

ISSN: 0085-6401 (Print) 1479-0270 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/csas20

Ravana’s Sri Lanka: Redefining the Sinhala Nation?

Dileepa Witharana

To cite this article: Dileepa Witharana (2019): Ravana’s Sri Lanka: Redefining the Sinhala
Nation?, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, DOI: 10.1080/00856401.2019.1632560

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00856401.2019.1632560

Published online: 08 Aug 2019.

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SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES
https://doi.org/10.1080/00856401.2019.1632560

ARTICLE

Ravana’s Sri Lanka: Redefining the Sinhala Nation?

Dileepa Witharana
Department of Mathematics and Philosophy of Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Technology, The
Open University of Sri Lanka, Nawala, Nugegoda, Sri Lanka

ABSTRACT KEYWORDS
By examining the public discourse on Ravana that has been wide- Contemporary Sinhala
spread among Sinhalese in the recent past, this paper suggests nationalism; ethnicity; Hela
that the Sinhala nation is perhaps on the verge of being rede- Havula; Hela Ravana; myth-
making; post-war Sri Lanka;
fined. In comparison to the origin story of the Sinhalese that Ravana; religion and
remained seriously unchallenged till the end of the twentieth cen- media; yakkhas
tury, in which the Sinhalese were considered the descendants of
the Aryan prince Vijaya who arrived on the island around 2,500
years ago, this new narrative identifies the yakkha king Ravana as
the originator of the Sinhala nation by going further back into
the past. The paper also attempts to explain why this surge of
interest in Ravana is taking place at this particular moment and
not earlier.

The allochthonous and autochthonous in representations of

Sinhala heritage
The Sinhalese people have usually looked to the past to mobilise the imagining of their
nation’s membership. According to popular perception, the Sinhalese, the majority eth-
nic community of Sri Lanka, are inheritors of a great civilisation which has a history of
thousands of years. Up until the end of the twentieth century, the dominant narrative
of the Sinhala nation that circulated among the general public, unchallenged seriously
by any other popular narrative, was a simple story. According to it, the Sinhalese
descended from the Aryan prince Vijaya who arrived on the island from North India
in 543 BCE with a retinue of seven hundred. Vijaya defeated the island’s indigenous
inhabitants (the yakkhas), becoming the first in a series of Sinhala kings who ruled the
island until the Kingdom of Kandy surrendered to the British in 1815. The Buddha
himself ordained that the successors of Vijaya should rule Sri Lanka as protectors of
the Buddhist religion (buddhasasana).1
The Vijaya colonisation narrative represents the allochthonous account of the origins
of the Sinhala people, one which has played a major role in the political discourse of

CONTACT Dileepa Witharana bdwit@ou.ac.lk

1. Wilhelm Geiger, The Mahavamsa, or, The Great Chronicle of Ceylon (Colombo: The Ceylon Government
Information Department, [1912] 1950), p. 55.

ß 2019 South Asian Studies Association of Australia

2 D. WITHARANA

Sri Lanka since independence from Britain in 1948.2 In this essay, I explore an alterna-
tive, autochthonous account of the origins of the Sinhala people that has come to prom-
inence in popular imagination in Sri Lanka today. This alternative narrative displaces
the origins of the Sinhala people into the far distant past, positing Ravana, demon king
of the Ramayana, as an ancient king of the island, and fons et origo of Sinhala language
and culture. As demonstrated by the other contributions to the special section of this
journal, the notion that Ravana was an ancient king of the island has circulated in Sri
Lankan literature and folklore since the premodern period. Here I trace the evolution
of the discourse concerning Ravana and the origins of the ‘Hela’ (primordial Sinhala)
people in the context of modern nationalism, paying special attention to its prolifer-
ation roughly since the beginning of this century. In the following sections I argue that
the recent popularity of ‘Hela Ravana’ among Sinhala speakers reflects a relatively
long-felt desire for a past that is different to the one suggested by the Vijaya narrative,
along with a renewed sense of national pride gained by the Sinhalese in the wake of the
defeat of the Tamil separatist movement run by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
(LTTE), at the beginning of this century.3 I argue furthermore that the ‘Hela Ravana’
movement works to distance Ravana from his traditional depiction in Hindu render-
ings of the Ramayana, and positions him instead as a historical figure unconnected
to India.

‘Hela Ravana’ in historical perspective4

Available documents indicate that Ravana first began to appear in Sinhala poetry, folk-
lore and historiography in the Kotte and early Kandyan periods, i.e. the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries.5 Legends and popular songs and poetry associated episodes from
the Ramayana with the topography of the central mountains and extreme south of the
island. Such informally transmitted narratives are by their very nature impossible to
date with any precision, but are attested to in Portuguese chronicles of the seventeenth
century, giving us at least a terminus ante quem with respect to their circulation in

2. While the textual origins of the allochthonous account of the peopling of Sri Lanka can be traced back to the
English translation of the Pali chronicle, the Mahavamsa, the significance of the Vijaya story and emic
perceptions of ‘Sinhala identity’ in premodernity remains a question debated often in academic writing and in
political polemics. Rambukwella discerns a spectrum between ‘primordialists’ (including Gananath Obeyesekere,
K.M. De Silva and K.N.O. Dharmadasa), who argue for an early date for the consolidation of Sinhala–Buddhist
political self-awareness, and ‘modernists’ (such as R.A.L.H. Gunawardana, Michael Roberts and John Rogers),
who argue that the present-day configuration of Sinhala–Buddhist religious, linguistic, ethnic and political iden-
tity is largely a construction of the colonial period. See Harshana Rambukwella, ‘The Search for Nation:
Exploring Sinhala Nationalism and Its Others in Sri Lankan Anglophone and Sinhala-Language Writing’, PhD dis-
sertation, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 2008, pp. 12–3.
3. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) was at the forefront of the Tamil military movement that fought for
a separate country of Eelam for Sri Lanka’s Tamils. The LTTE was successful in establishing a de facto state of
Tamil Eelam with its own military machine, police force, banking system, court system and television and radio
channels. At the end of an almost thirty-year civil war, the LTTE was comprehensively defeated by the forces of
the Sri Lankan government.
4. The books, media and interviews used as source material for this section were collected by the author from
2013 to 2015.
5. See the contributions by Henry and by Young and Friedrich in this special section: Justin W. Henry,
‘Explorations in the Transmission of the Ramayana in Sri Lanka’, in South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies,
Vol. 42, no. 4 (2019), doi:10.1080/00856401.2019.1631739; Jonathan Young and Philip Friedrich, ‘Mapping
Lanka’s Moral Boundaries: Representations of Socio-Political Difference in the Ravana Rajavaliya’, in South Asia:
Journal of South Asian Studies, Vol. 42, no. 4 (2019), doi:10.1080/00856401.2019.1633114.
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 3

southwestern Sri Lanka.6 Ravana’s appearance as the first king of the island in the
Rajavaliya—a Sinhala chronicle of the seventeenth century which held authoritative
status as a supplement to the Mahavamsa7—testifies to the acknowledgement of some
element of historicity to the Ramayana narrative in the popular imagination of Sri
Lanka’s late medieval period.8
The first attested instance of Ravana’s configuration in modern ethno-political dis-
course appeared in an early Sinhala-language newspaper, Lak Mini Kirula, which, in its
1 June 1881 edition, portrayed Ravana as ruler over the powerful kingdom of
‘Heladiva’ in 2,837 BCE (more than 2,000 years before the arrival of Vijaya).9 The
proposition that Ravana was the first king of Sri Lanka and progenitor of the Sinhala
people gained prominence several decades later under the auspices of the ‘Hela Havula’
or ‘Sinhala Heritage’ movement. The term ‘hela’ is an abbreviated variant of the word
‘Sinhala’ in traditional usage—being at the same time the name (metonymically) for
traditional Sinhala poetry, and possessing colloquial, non- or even anti-Sanskrit over-
tones to a modern Sinhala-speaking audience.10 Munidasa Cumaratunga, who initiated
the movement during the 1930s and 1940s, was the pioneer in bringing to public atten-
tion the hypothesis of an independent origin for the Sinhala people, one native to Sri
Lanka and not associated with the colonisation by Prince Vijaya (and the North Indian
ethnic aetiology that the Mahavamsa narrative entails).11 Cumaratunga’s editorials

6. Femao de Queyroz, The Temporal and Spiritual Conquest of Ceylon, Book 1, S.G. Perera (trans.) (New York: AMS
Press, [1930] 1975), pp. I.8–9. The survival of Ravana mythology in rural southern Sri Lanka in the mid
twentieth century is attested in the 1995 work of Beligalla, which documents Leonard Woolf’s visit to the island
in 1960, undertaken some fifty years after his retirement as a civil servant in British-ruled Ceylon. A provincial
revenue officer who had served under Woolf during his time as an assistant government agent (from 1904 to
1911) related the connection of various landmarks around Hambantota to Ravana’s ancient reign: Usangoda as
the location of Ravana’s palace; Velipatanvila as the place where his personal air vehicle used to land; and
Abarana Ella as the waterfall at which the princesses of Ravana’s harem committed suicide after Ravana lost the
war with Rama. See Wijesinghe Beligalla, Leonard Woolf Samaga Gamanak (A Journey with Leonard Woolf)
(Colombo: S. Godage & Bros, 1995).
7. The Mahavamsa is considered to be the Sri Lankan national chronicle that carries the official history of the
island. It provides a narrative of an unbroken national past from the time of the Buddha in the fifth century
BCE to the fourth century CE.
8. See A.V. Suraweera, Rajavaliya: A Comprehensive Account of the Kings of Sri Lanka (Ratmalana: Vishva Lekha
Publications, 2000), pp. 15–6.
9. See K.N.O. Dharmadasa, Language, Religion, and Ethnic Assertiveness: The Growth of Sinhalese Nationalism in Sri
Lanka (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1992), pp. 119–20; and Nira Wickramasinghe, Sri Lanka in the
Modern Age: A History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 95.
10. See Sandagomi Coperahewa, ‘Purifying the Sinhala Language: The Hela Movement of Munidasa Cumaratunga
(1930s–1940s)’, in Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 46, no. 4 (2011), pp. 857–91. Cumaratunga portrayed Hela culture
as a centre of global civilisation and sought to remove both North and South Indian influences in the Sinhala
language by eliminating Sanskrit, Pali and Tamil loan-words. Cumaratunga went to the extent of bestowing
new Sinhala language names on to the standard Indian terms for musical notes. See Garrett M. Field,
‘Commonalities of Creative Resistance: Rapiyel Tennakoon’s Bat Language and Sunil Santha’s “Song for the
Mother Tongue”, in Sri Lanka Journal of the Humanities, Vol. 38, no. 1/2 (2012), pp. 1–24; and Garrett M. Field,
‘Music for Inner Domains: Sinhala Song and the Arya and Hela Schools of Cultural Nationalism in Colonial Sri
Lanka’, in Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 73, no. 4 (2014), pp. 1043–58.
11. See Munidasa Cumaratunga, Lakmini Pahan Kathuveki (Colombo: Visidunu Publishers, 2006); and Coperahewa,
‘Purifying the Sinhala Language’, pp. 857–91. Activities by the Sinhala language purification movement started
much earlier than the formal establishment of Hela Havula in 1941. It represented strong opinions against those
who proposed taking steps to adopt the equivalent of the spoken idiom for literary purposes. See K.N.O.
Dharmadasa, ‘Nativism, Diglossia and the Sinhalese Identity in the Language Problem in Sri Lanka’, in
Linguistics, Vol. 15, no. 193 (1977), pp. 21–32. The relatively influential and widespread Hela Havula community,
represented significantly by members of the Sinhala-speaking middle class—especially from among school
teachers, principals, notaries and Buddhist monks—were at the forefront of the radical social change of 1956
that brought Sinhala nationalism into national politics as a decisive factor. See Coperahewa, ‘Purifying the
4 D. WITHARANA

appearing in Lak Mini Pahana in 1934 refer to the great king Ravana and the great
‘Hela dynasty’ led by his descendants.12
Ravana found an appreciative group of promotors among some mid twentieth-
century artists and authors who were members of the Hela Havula movement. Rapiyel
Tennakoon’s celebrated 1939 poem ‘Vavuluva’ (Bat Language) portrays Ravana and his
sister Surpanakha in a positive light, with Surpanakha represented as a beautiful and
friendly woman. Sita, the traditional heroine of the Ramayana narrative, is seen in
Tennakoon’s version as dreaming of going to Lanka to meet Ravana, who in turn pro-
tects her during her stay on the island.13 The radio classic ‘Lanka Lanka Pembara
Lanka’ (‘Lanka, Beloved Lanka’), sung by Sunil Shantha and written by the popular
songwriter Arisen Ahubudu, refers to Bali, Taru and Ravana, the powerful kings of the
lineage of the Hela dynasty.14 The stage drama, Sakvithi Ravana, produced in the
1980s also by Arisen Ahubudu, renders Ravana as the hero of the Rama–Ravana story:
in his preface to the play, Ahubudu identified 2,554–2,517 BCE as the time during
which Ravana ruled Lankapura.15
The Hela Havula’s attempt to establish the narrative of Ravana as the history of the
Sinhala nation was a significant intervention, yet it was not very effective. Various
scholars have expressed opinions as to why the Hela Havula language purification
movement generally failed to gain wider acceptance in the country, hence affecting the
popular spread of the Hela Ravana discourse. For some, the Hela theory was perhaps
too literary and complex to enter popular public space.16 Another important factor
that was disadvantageous to the Hela theory’s attempt to capture the public imagin-
ation at large was its head-on clash with the power elite of Sinhala society, who acted
as a barrier in keeping the Hela theory from the public imagination.17 The proposal for
the ultra-pure, archaic Sinhala language as the standard for written purposes could also
have run counter to the populist spirit of the times.18 As well, in a society that was
caste hierarchical,19 the fact that the members of the Hela Havula were primarily from
a lower caste, the Durava (toddy tappers), may have acted against it in its attempt to
redefine the Sinhala nation differently from the political elite who were from the trad-
itionally elite Govigama caste and especially the Karava caste that had joined the elite
bandwagon during colonial rule.20

Sinhala Language’, pp. 857–9; K.N.O. Dharmadasa, ‘A Nativistic Reaction to Colonialism: The Sinhala-Buddhist
Revival in Sri Lanka’, in Asian Studies, Vol. XII, no. 1 (1974), pp. 168–73; and Dharmadasa, ‘Nativism, Diglossia
and the Sinhalese Identity’, pp. 21–32.
12. See Cumaratunga, Lakmini Pahan Kathuveki. The dates of the essays are 18 Sept. and 23 Oct. 1934.
13. Field, ‘Commonalities of Creative Resistance’, p. 5.
14. Both Shantha and Ahubudu were prominent members of the Hela Havula movement. Alaw Isi Sebi Hela,
another prominent Hela Havula member, promoted the theory of pre-Mahavamsa Hela civilisation in his own
work too. See N.R. Dewasiri, ‘Ithihasaya Liveema Ha Sinhala Jathikavadee Drushtiya (Writing History and the
Sinhala Nationalistic Ideology)’, in Prathimana: Annual Journal of the Social Science Association of the University
of Ruhuna, Vol. 6 (2011), p. 40.
15. Arisen Ahubudu, Sakvithi Ravana Naluva (Sakvithi Ravana Drama) (Colombo: Arisen Ahubudu, [1998] 2007), p. 7.
16. See Wickramasinghe, Sri Lanka in the Modern Age, p. 96.
17. See Coperahewa, ‘Purifying the Sinhala Language’.
18. See Dharmadasa, ‘Nativism, Diglossia and the Sinhalese Identity’.
19. See Field, ‘Commonalities of Creative Resistance’.
20. See Kumari Jayawardena, Nobodies to Somebodies: The Rise of the Colonial Bourgeoisie in Sri Lanka (London/New
York: Zed Books, 2002); and Michael Roberts, Caste Conflict and Elite Formation: The Rise of a Karava Elite in Sri
Lanka, 1500–1931 (Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 5

‘Hela Ravana’ in the twenty-first century

Recently, however, the notion that Ravana was a historical king of the island has
attracted serious public attention. Though it is not clear how far the Hela Ravana nar-
rative has been successful in replacing the Vijaya narrative among the Sinhalese nation-
wide, which, in fact, is a theme for another study, its spread is unprecedented. In
comparison to the times of Hela Havula, the discourse on Hela Ravana in recent times
seems to have had far easier access to the general public. While leaving the Vijaya nar-
rative to the side as the official history of the nation, the Sinhalese seem to have
embraced the recently emergent new narrative as an alternative. According to Nandana
Weeraratne, the senior journalist who worked for Ravaya weekly and then for BBC
Sandeshaya, ‘why not go for [the] Ravana myth, the better myth—after all both narra-
tives are myths’.21 In October 2013, while taking an ‘office train’,22 I witnessed initial
signs of this surge of interest in Hela Ravana. Passengers in the compartment, who usu-
ally travel together on a daily basis, were discussing details of the technologically
sophisticated dynasty King Ravana had built thousands of years ago. Most of them
were openly in favour of Ravana over Vijaya as the forefather of the Sinhala nation.
After listening to more discussions of Hela Ravana in late 2013 and early 2014, con-
ducted at places where the participants were sympathetic to the narrative (for example,
by young academic and non-academic staff at the university where I work, by neigh-
bours in the housing scheme where I live in the Colombo suburbs, and by artists who
gather every evening at Sudarshi, the Sinhala cultural centre, a place I regularly visit), I
gained the confidence to identify this as a worthy research topic.
The investigation I conducted indicated that the narrative of Hela Ravana is fairly
widespread and also unprecedented. Bookshops in the capital city of Colombo and in
other major towns display new and republished books on different dimensions of the
Ravana narrative, a trend that could be witnessed during the first one-and-a-half deca-
des of this century.23 Several fictional accounts involving King Ravana have been

21. Personal communication, Colombo, 10 May 2015.

22. The 7.25 am train from Kottawa to Colombo Fort used to mostly transport commuters to work in government
and private institutions in Colombo.
23. Books advancing the ‘Hela Ravana’ hypothesis include Ahubudu, Sakvithi Ravana Naluva; Manewe Vimalaratana,
Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru (Unknown Information on the Yakkha Tribe) (Mahagalkadawala:
Manewe Vimalaratna, [2001] 2008); Manewe Vimalaratana, Yakshagothrika Bashava Saha Ravi Shailaasha
Vansha Kathava (The Language of the Yakkhas and the Story of the Ravi Shailaasha Community) (Meegalewa:
Manewe Vimalaratna, 2012); S. Dasanayake, Ramayanaya (Dankotuwa: Vasana Publishers, 2009); N.C.K. Kiriella,
Ramayanaya and Historical Rawana (Colombo: N.C.K. Kiriella, 2009); P.S.T. Chulawansa, Rajya Sri Naama Sahitha
Avurudu 28,000 Ka Sinhala Wansa Kathawa (Sinhala Dynasty of 28,000 Years with the List of Kings) (JaEla:
Samanthi Book Publishers, 2010); P.S.T. Chulawansa, Hela Ithihasaye Ravana Rajathuma (King Ravana of Hela
History) (JaEla: Samanthi Book Publishers, 2012); Ariyadasa Senevirathne, Sri Lanka Ravana Rajadaniya (Ravana’s
Kingdom of Sri Lanka) (Colombo: Sarasavi Publishers, 2012); Mirando Obeyesekerea, Ravana Shishtacharaya
(Ravana Civilization) (JaEla: Samanthi Book Publishers, 2012); Mirando Obeyesekere, Sri Lankave Ravana
Adirajyage Sanskruthika Urumaya (The Cultural Legacy of the Emperor Ravana of Sri Lanka) (JaEla: Samanthi Book
Publishers, 2013); Mirando Obeyesekere, Jana Urumaya (Folk Heritage) (JaEla: Samanthi Book Publishers, 2014);
B.M. Jayathilake, Sri Ravana Puwatha: Hela Yak Parapure Kathava (Sri Ravana News: The Story of Hela Yakkha
Dynasty) (Colombo: B.M. Jayathilake, [2012] 2013); S. Gunasekara, Aithihaasika Ravana (Historical Ravana)
(Colombo: Visidunu Publishers, [2012] 2013); S. Gunasekara, Lanka Ithihasaye Hela Yugaya: Vijayagamanayata
Pera Lankava (The Hela Era of Sri Lankan History: Lanka before the Arrival of Vijaya) (Colombo: Visidunu
Publishers, [2007] 2013); Kolonnawe Siri Sumangala, Sri Lankeshwara Maha Ravana (Ravana the Great, Lord of Sri
Lanka) (Colombo: Kolonnawe Siri Sumangala, 2013); and Gayan Sandakelum Vithana Gamage, Hela Wanshaya:
Ravanavaadaya (Hela Wansaya: Ravana-ism) (Homagama: Vithana Gamage, 2015).
6 D. WITHARANA

written and some of them republished too.24 Due to popular demand, Ruwan Susitha’s
fictional Ravana Meheyuma (Ravana Mission) was printed and reprinted thrice during
a span of two years.25 Indicating its influence across the language divide, fiction on
Hela Ravana has also been written in the English language.26 Interactive websites with
a relatively wide readership which have been in operation for several years have also
played an important role in constructing the Ravana narrative.27 The spread of the nar-
rative has resulted in Sigiriya (a fifth-century palace atop a stone monolith, now a
popular tourist destination in Sri Lanka) becoming the top image result in a Google
search for ‘Ravana’s fortress’. I noticed that details of different aspects of the Hela
Ravana dynasty, explained at length in these books and websites, were used freely by
the public when involved in discussions. Another sign of the popularity of the Hela
Ravana narrative among the Sinhalese is the publication of a series of articles on Hela
Ravana by the popular privately-owned newspapers Randiva, Maubima, Tharunaya
and Rivira.28 The English-language newspaper, The Daily Mirror, recently joined the
trend.29 Between 2010 and 2014, each newspaper published full-page articles every
week discussing diverse aspects of the Hela Ravana narrative.
Evidence of the spread of the Hela Ravana narrative is not confined to literary sour-
ces available in print and online. Songs dedicated to the great ‘Hela king’ Ravana have
been composed and are available on YouTube.30 The Ravana Brothers musical group
has been responsible for composing some of the better-known songs.31 The most cru-
cial role in relation to the Hela Ravana narrative, however, has been played by radio
and television. V-FM radio and the popular television channels Derana, Swarnawahini
and ITN carried a series of programmes which ran for months from 2012 to 2014.32
While these programmes can be considered responses from the island’s main media
institutions to the emerging public interest in Hela Ravana, they also contributed

24. Manewe Vimalaratana, Padma Pali (Thambuththegama: Vimalaratana Manewe, 2009); Markus H. Fernando,
Koggala Nilame I: Bootha Vidya Paryeshana Kathandaraya Koggala Nilame (An Account of Research on the Science
of Ghosts: Koggala Nilame I) (JaEla: Samanthi Book Publishers, 2013); and Markus H. Fernando, Koggala Nilame
II: Bootha Vidya Paryeshana Kathandaraya Koggala Nilame (An Account of Research on the Science of Ghosts:
Koggala Nilame II) (JaEla: Samanthi Book Publishers, 2013).
25. Ruwan Susitha, Ravana Meheyuma (Ravana Mission) (Colombo: Sarasavi Publishers, [2011] 2013).
26. Sunela Jayewardene, The Line of Lanka: Myths and Memories of an Island (Colombo: Sailfish, 2017).
27. ‘Sahurda Thotupala’, active from 2010 to mid 2012, contained 124 posts on various aspects of Hela Ravana
history; the site was accessible till 2014 and had registered 214,000 hits as of 21 May 2014. A Sinhala–English
bilingual resource page, ‘Ravana—The Greatest Emperor of Asia’, remains active and has also attracted high
web traffic [https://ravanalankapura.wordpress.com/, accessed 15 Nov. 2018].
28. Examples of weekly newspapers include Randiva (which carried a series of weekly articles for seven months
from Mar. 2012 to Sept. 2012); Maubima (which under the title ‘Ravanavatha’ carried a series of weekly articles
from 2010 to 2011 based on interviews conducted with Mirando Obeyesekere, one of the key commentators on
the Ravana discourse); Tharunaya (which under the title ‘Sinhale Ravana’ carried 29 weekly articles from Nov.
2013 to June 2014).
29. In 2014, The Daily Mirror started carrying articles on Ravana once a week.
30. ‘Ravana Song’ (2012) by Amarasiri Peiris, Saman Lenin and Benni Schaschek (24,220 views as of 10 Aug. 2018);
and ‘Ravana’ by Erandi Madushika (174,460 views as of 10 Aug. 2018).
31. ‘Ravana Song—A Song for King Ravana’ (2011) by the Ravana Brothers (97,456 views as of 10 Aug. 2018);
‘Atanata’ (2012) by the Ravana Brothers (27,583 views as of 10 Aug. 2018); and ‘Ravana Sinhala New Year Song’
(2017) by the Ravana Brothers (75,119 views as of 10 Aug. 2018).
32. V-FM, Derana and Swarnawahini are private television channels and ITN is one of the two state-run channels. V-
FM aired a five-month-long programme, Lakviskam-Ravana, from Nov. 2012 to Mar. 2013 which was dedicated
to Ravana. Derana’s Helawanshaya, too, was dedicated specially to discussing the Ravana dynasty and was a
weekly programme telecast from 26 Sept. 2013 to 29 May 2014 [http://www.derana.lk/index.php?route=pro-
grams/programs/programdetails&pid=210&page=2, accessed 23 July 2019].
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 7

significantly to further popularisation of the narrative among the Sinhala public.

Telecast on popular television showtimes in the evenings, these programmes invited
panels of Hela Ravana commentators to discuss the Ravana-related past. Some episodes
broadcast visits by the programmes’ crews to archaeological sites where ‘experts’ narra-
tively ‘removed’ sites from the ‘Vijaya-landscape’ and repositioned them in the ‘Hela
Ravana-landscape’, and audiences were given the opportunity to engage with panels of
commentators while the programmes were on air. Family gatherings, travel time on
public transport with friends, or breaks at work with colleagues are examples of spaces
used by the general public to discuss, analyse and debate what they heard or saw on
these radio and television programmes. The discussion I witnessed on the ‘office train’
(mentioned above) is one such example; the discussion was based on the popular pro-
gramme Helawanshaya that had been telecast on the Derana channel the previous day.
Exhibitions and ceremonies to commemorate Ravana have also been held in recent
times. Ravana has been a reverential subject in the Colombo art world as well, as dem-
onstrated by an exhibition of paintings by Indumini Bandara titled ‘Indumini Maha
Ravana’ held on 19 and 20 February 2011 in Colombo.33 The popular Devram Vihara
temple complex on the outskirts of Colombo—headed by monk and former parliamen-
tarian Ven. Kolonnuwe Sumangala—conducts an annual procession called the ‘Maha
Ravana Perahera’. Its 2013 inaugural procession was attended by Gotabhaya Rajapaksa,
brother of President Mahinda Rajapaksa and then secretary of the Ministry of
Defence.34 On 9 October 2014, a statue of ‘King Ravana’ was recrowned in Kelaniya,
near Colombo, to mark ‘5,000 years of Ravana history’ and the beginning of a new
‘Hela Era’. The event was organised by Kanchana Manamendra, one of the leading
commentators on Hela Ravana.35
The interest in associating with Ravana taken by the private sector and the govern-
ment provides further proof of the popularity of the Hela Ravana narrative.
Commercial institutions have recently tapped into the Ravana brand, for example the
‘Ravana Aviation Academy’ flying school and ‘SriRavana.com’, purveyors of astro-
logical software. In 2014, newspapers reported the launch of a film on King Ravana,
the first of a series of three films.36 On 11 November 2018, the private television chan-
nel Derana started telecast of an ongoing ‘mega’ teledrama, Ravana, which, according
to the station, is the most expensive series in the history of Sri Lankan teledramas.
With the tagline ‘not based on Valmiki’s Ramayana’, and starring Sri Lankan actors
and actresses, its trailer identifies it as a ‘production for Helas by Helas’. The current
surge of interest in Hela Ravana, which originated among the lower layers of society
and in the public sphere, seems to have also influenced organs of the government. The
‘Indumini Maha Ravana’ exhibition was held at the National Art Gallery with the min-
ister of cultural affairs attending as the chief guest. In 2014, the Ministry of Technology
and Research indicated interest in allocating funds for excavations at sites said to be

33. See Indumini Bandara blog [http://induminibandara.blogspot.com/2013/02/past-events.html?m=0, accessed 15

Nov. 2018].
34. D.C.C. de Koning, ‘The Ritualizing of the Martial and Benevolent Side of Ravana in Two Annual Rituals at the Sri
Devram Maha Viharaya in Pannipitiya, Sri Lanka’, in Religions, Vol. 9, no. 250 (2018), pp. 12–5.
35. Personal communication with a colleague of Kanchana Manamendra, Colombo, 2016.
36. The first of three films on King Ravana, Gagana Serisaranna (Voyager in the Sky), is to be directed by Sanjaya
Nirmal. The Daily Mirror (4 Aug. 2014), ‘Impulse’, p. 1.
8 D. WITHARANA

linked to the Ravana dynasty.37 Three authors of popular books and newspaper col-
umns on Hela Ravana—Sooriya Gunasekara, Mirando Obeyesekere and Palitha
Galappathi—were publicly honoured by the national minister of culture and arts on 1
August 2014 at a ceremony held in the auditorium of the Colombo Museum for their
services to promoting research on King Ravana.38
The unprecedented spread of the Hela Ravana narrative among the Sinhalese in recent
times has started attracting the attention of academics and researchers. Since 2011, the
‘Hela Ravana myth’ has been included in the course unit, ‘Popular History’, taught to
final-year history undergraduates at the University of Colombo, and researchers have
begun investigating the Ravana revival. In addition to my presentation at the ‘Ramayana
workshop’ held in Colombo on 22 July 2016, Krishantha Fedricks from the University of
Colombo also made a presentation entitled ‘The Revival of Ravana in Contemporary
(Sinhala) Nationalist Discourse’. As described in the introduction to this special section,
Deborah de Koning, a student from Tilburg University in the Netherlands, is focusing
her PhD research on the reappraisal of Ravana among Sinhala Buddhists. ‘Ravanisation’
is the term she uses to identify this trend of the revitalisation of Ravana.39
While not all those advancing the ‘Hela Ravana’ hypothesis are united with respect
to the details of the story,40 all agree that Ravana was a sovereign of a prosperous king-
dom, the influence of which extended throughout the globe, and that the Sinhala peo-
ple are in fact descended from his yakkha clan. This claim is backed by commentators
on the Ravana narrative using a variety of means. The Vargapurnikava, the mysterious
palm-leaf text on ‘yakkha history’ seen by hardly anyone, plays an important role in
the claim. The Buddhist monk Manewe Vimalaratana relates the contents of the
Vargapurnikava, which is allegedly in his possession. According to him, it was commit-
ted to writing in the eighteenth century on the basis of an orally transmitted text in the
‘yakkha language’.41 Ven. Vimalaratana has produced two commentaries on
the Vargapurnikava: Unknown Information on the Yakkha Tribe42 and The Language of
the Yakkhas and the Story of the Ravi Shailaasha Community,43 which according to
him are interpretations by senior members of the current generation of the yakkha lin-
eage.44 The Vargapurnikava is often cited by Ravana commentators, who employ
Vimalaratana as an honoured guest at Ravana-themed events (book launches, televi-
sion, radio discussions and ceremonies to commemorate Ravana). The re-reading of
Brahmi and Sinhala inscriptions and the reinterpretation of archaeological sites are

37. This was revealed by a close associate of the then minister at a meeting held in Sept. 2014 in Colombo in
which the author was a participant.
38. See Department of Cultural Affairs–Sri Lanka, ‘A Felicitation Ceremony in Honour of the King “Sri Maha Ravana”
on 01 August’ [http://www.culturaldept.gov.lk/web/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id= 179%3Aa-
felicitation-ceremony-in-honour-of-the-king-sri-maha-ravana-on-01-august-&catid=3%3Anews-a-events&Itemid=
70&lang ¼ en, accessed 21 Jan. 2015].
39. See Tilburg University website [https://www.tilburguniversity.edu/webwijs/show/d.d.c.dekoning.htm, accessed 5
April 2019].
40. For example, the dating of Ravana’s actual reign varies widely, from some 30,000 years BCE to 4,000 years BCE.
41. Vimalaratana does not make a positive identification between hela and yakkha bhasava in his writing.
42. Vimalaratana, Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru.
43. Vimalaratana, Yakshagothrika Bashava Saha Ravi Shailaasha Vansha Kathava.
44. Vimalaratana Thero, a Buddhist monk and a graduate in linguistics from the University of Sri Jayewardenepura,
identifies himself as a member of the yakkha lineage, whose members are said to still survive in the North
Central Province of Sri Lanka, and he claims to be a member of the family that has the custodianship of the
Vargapurnikava from the previous generation.
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 9

used to boost the credibility of the Hela Ravana narrative. The presenter of the televi-
sion programme, Helawanshaya, for example, made weekly visits to archaeological sites
with his camera crew in search of new evidence to establish the history of the Helas as
descendants of the yakkhas. Contents of various Sanskrit texts such as the Vaimanika
Sastra are also used as ‘proof’ of the advanced state of engineering in the Ravana dyn-
asty.45 The assertion that all Indian languages derived from ‘original Sinhala’ (hela bha-
sava), with the implication that the technology described in the Sanskrit texts belonged
originally to Sri Lankans, thus provides the narrative twist that distinguishes the Hela
Ravana claims from similar narratives regarding the distant Hindu past in India.46

The sociology and politics of ‘Hela Ravana’

Even though the natural tendency of academics is to disregard the narrative of Ravana
as modern myth making,47 the gap between the academic sphere and the popular pub-
lic sphere has allowed the surge of public interest in Ravana to remain relatively
unaffected. The academic response to the ‘Hela Ravana’ narrative expressed in the pub-
lic media, the avenue through which public opinion is influenced, has been mixed.
While some declared the Ravana narrative a great myth compared to the myth of
Vijaya,48 there seems be some sympathy among certain academics towards the ‘yakkha
descent’ theory.49
Twenty-first-century Hela Ravana promoters offer minute details of the advanced
features of science and engineering used by the Ravana dynasty which allowed ancient
Sri Lanka to be a highly advanced civilisation, with developments in medical care and
several areas of engineering being highlighted. The Ravana narrative refers to six med-
ical books written by Ravana, whose grandfather, the sage Pulasthi, is said to have
founded the fundamentals and practice of eastern Ayurvedic treatment.50 Helas who

45. The Vaimanika Sastra is invoked by Hel*a Ravana theorists as evidence of the intricate technical knowledge
relating to aircraft technology in ancient Sri Lanka. Hela Ravana promoters also invoke the Rigveda Samhita,
Satapatha Brahmana, the Markandeya and Visnu Puranas, the Harivamsa, Vikrama Urvasiya, Uttararama Carita,
Harsa Carita, Samarangana Sutradhara, and the Tamil-language Civaka Cintamani. Bhoja’s Samarangana
Sutradhara is presented as offering complete diagrams of vimanas or ‘flying machines’, covering aspects of air-
craft production, flight and maintenance.
46. On fantastic depictions of the technology of ancient India among contemporary Hindu nationalists, see Meera
Nanda, Prophets Facing Backward: Postmodern Critiques of Science and Hindu Nationalism in India (Newark, NJ:
Rutgers University Press, 2003).
47. See, for instance, the proceedings of the Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka’s 2010 symposium on the Tourist
Authority’s ‘Ramayana Trail’ [http://www.royalasiaticsociety.lk/research-projects/symposium-on-the-tourist-
authorities-ramayana-trail/, accessed 15 Nov. 2018].
48. Dewasiri confronts the narrative of Ravana in his newspaper article under the heading, ‘Ravana, a Truth or a
Lie?’. Based on the argument that the facts represented in the narratives are more fictional when one goes
back in time, and the supposed ‘archaeological evidence’ in support of the Ravana narrative could also mean
imagination rather than facts or reality, Dewasiri concludes that the Ravana narrative is a myth. N.R. Dewasiri,
‘Ravana, a Truth or a Lie?’, Ravaya (7 and 14 Sept. 2014) p. 10 and p. 10 respectively.
49. Prof. Raj Somadeva has endorsed archaeological findings suggesting the existence in Sri Lanka of ‘a well
organised society of yakkha people, who were practising Buddhists, living more than 2000 years ago’. Raj
Somadeva, ‘Archaeological Findings Open New Chapter’, The Daily Mirror (2 Sept. 2014), p. A7.
50. The narrative of Ravana’s association with the sciences and Sastric learning predates his twenty-first-century revival
in Sri Lanka. Introducing the history of ancient Sinhala medical practice, the report of the committee appointed in
1950 by the Ceylonese government records that traditional Sinhala medicine was first developed by the Asuras
who were the initial inhabitants of the island. This knowledge was then transferred to the yakkhas (or raksasas)
who ruled the country after the Asuras and developed an advanced civilisation in Ceylon. Ravana’s family was given
the credit for further developing Sinhala medical practice in the report. ‘Committee Report on Ancient Sinhala
Medical Practice’, in Sessional Paper XVII of 1950, Sri Lanka National Archives, Colombo.
10 D. WITHARANA

are descended from Ravana are identified as top aviators, sailors and civil and irriga-
tion engineers. The Vaimanika Sastra is invoked by many commentators on the
Ravana narrative to describe at length the details of aviation and flying machines pos-
sessed by the Ravana dynasty, including details about aeroplanes, pilots, aerial routes,
food to be taken during air travel, suitable clothing, metals used in producing aero-
planes, the process of producing these metals, mirrors and their use in warfare, and a
variety of other related machinery.51 The current Ravana discourse refers to two global
marine traditions, one that originated in Alexandria in Egypt and the other in Kalyani
in Lankapura. This great Lankapura marine tradition is said to have been destroyed by
a tsunami, only after which tank-based irrigation was established by the Sinhalese or
Helas; it is considered one of the main areas of expertise of the Ravana dynasty. It is
claimed that the Hela dynasty possessed the technology to carry water underground in
the dry zone of Lankapura where the main yakkha kingdoms were located. The palaces
of the kings of the Ravana dynasty are considered advanced civil engineering construc-
tions, and it is also said that the line across Lankapura from the northwest to the east
comprised a long line of building complexes. The expertise of the Hela civilisation is
also said to have extended to areas such as mapping, surveying, textile manufacturing,
construction of statues, gold and silver work, and so on.52
Alongside depictions of Sri Lanka’s ancient technological prowess, other interesting
aspects of the putative ‘Hela yakkha culture’ as described by today’s commentators can
be noted. The ‘Hela Ravana’ picture of ancient Sinhala society contrasts with other
depictions (such as, for example, those of the Mahavamsa) of Sri Lankan women in its
elevation of their social status, and their role in government and religion.
Commentaries on the Vargapurnikava by Vimalaratana describe women’s education as
a staple practice in Ravana’s kingdom, with examples of prominent female doctors, of
women involved in court, city and village administration (maha sabhas and variga sab-
has), as well as in active combat and training in indigenous martial arts (angampora).53
References are made to several volumes of yakkha laws that were introduced by the
princesses of the Ravana dynasty.54 There were no restrictions on women being
ordained as nuns (bhikkhunis) and attaining enlightenment. According to
Vimalaratana, Queen Kavilashapali (the yakkhani Kuveni of the Mahavamsa) was the
first Sri Lankan to attain the first stage of enlightenment (to become a sotapanna or
‘stream enterer’)—this even before she heard the dhamma from the Buddha (who sub-
sequently visited Sri Lanka at her invitation).55 After listening to the Buddha,
Kavilashapali attained Arhath-hood,56 the final stage of enlightenment.57

51. Gunasekara, Aithihaasika Ravana, pp. 65–72; and Gunasekara, Lanka Ithihasaye Hela Yugaya, pp. 92–112.
52. Vimalaratana, Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru; and Vimalaratana, Yakshagothrika Bashava Saha Ravi
Shailaasha Vansha Kathava.
53. Vimalaratana, Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru, pp. 31, 41; and Vimalaratana, Yakshagothrika Bashava
Saha Ravi Shailaasha Vansha Kathava, pp. ix, 33, 36, 52.
54. Vimalaratana, Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru, p. 77.
55. Vimalaratana, Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru, p. 31; and Vimalaratana, Yakshagothrika Bashava
Saha Ravi Shailaasha Vansha Kathava, p. 16.
56. Vimalaratana, Yaksha Goothrikayange Aprakata Thorathuru, p. 31; and Vimalaratana, Yakshagothrika Bashava
Saha Ravi Shailaasha Vansha Kathava, pp. 17, 25.
57. On traditional representations in South Asia literature of women as belonging to the ‘inner domain’ or home,
‘where the spiritual dimension of national culture is safeguarded’, see Partha Chatterjee, Nationalist Thought and
the Colonial World: A Derivative Discourse (London: Zed Books, 1986). On the frequent portrayal of women in
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 11

While the Hela Ravana discourse demonstrates an obvious attempt at reclaiming a

‘glorious national past’ in a general sense (a nationalist claim well known in other con-
texts), it contains numerous, more specific associations with Sinhala nationalism.
These reached their zenith in the late 1990s and 2000s during the war conducted by
the Sri Lankan government against the LTTE and the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime that
provided leadership to it. Many prominent commentators on the Ravana narrative gen-
erally backed the war against the LTTE. Songs composed by the Ravana Brothers on
the greatness of King Ravana often display images of the Sri Lankan army and air force
in action against the LTTE, with the Sri Lankan forces often referred to as ‘Ravana
balakaya’ (‘Ravana forces’).
Ruwan Susitha’s 2011 novel, Ravana Meheyuma (Ravana Mission), offers a case in
point. The plot describes a dramatic unfolding of events over a single night following
the accidental discovery of the palace of King Ravana in Horton Plains in the central
highlands of the island. The Sri Lankan military, led by the secretary to the Ministry of
Defence (the president’s brother, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa), realising the importance of
the site as a locus of global cultural heritage, embarks on a race against time to save the
palace before the United States Air Force can launch an air strike intended to destroy
the palace. An archaeologist, a historian and a journalist from Colombo are hastily and
forcibly recruited by the Sri Lankan armed forces and airlifted to the mountains where
the site is located, with just a two-hour deadline to find the secrets of the palace before
the fighter planes of the US Air Force arrive. The discussion among the two professors
and the journalist during the next two hours is about what they see inside the under-
ground palace, and the history of the ‘Surya Vansaya’ that civilised and ruled the entire
world 10,000 years ago. They find this history in the library of the palace inscribed on
gold plates. In their discussion, Hela is seen as the origin and centre of the world, and
the Hela nation as a technologically advanced civilisation that used aeroplanes to travel
around the world and used nuclear weapons in war. After a last-minute discussion
with the secretary to the Ministry of Defence, the journalist starts a live telecast of the
important news from the site, forcing the Americans, who learn of the telecast, to aban-
don their plans. Ravana Meheyuma links the glorious past of the Ravana dynasty with
the regime of President Mahinda Rajapaksa. It identifies the regime, and especially the
secretary of the Ministry of Defence (the president’s brother), as providing the political
leadership for the war against the LTTE, and thus as the custodian of the Hela
Asura nation.

Conclusion: Redefining the Sinhala nation?

What accounts for the prodigious and peculiar explosion of interest in Ravana among
Sinhala–Buddhists that has occurred over the past decade? I argue that the twenty-
first-century Ravana movement was triggered by the superimposition of four factors:
two laying the groundwork and the other two triggering the explosion. The first factor
was the long-term desire of the Sinhala nation for its own independent story of the

national discourses as mistresses of conquerors, wartime rape victims and military prostitutes or as wives,
girlfriends and daughters waiting dutifully at home, see Nira Yuval-Davis, Gender and Nation (London/Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1997).
12 D. WITHARANA

past—a past that is radically different to the one proposed by the Vijaya narrative
which constantly reminds the Sinhalese of the dependency of the nation on India.
Historical tension with and antagonism towards India, an important feature of Sri
Lankan politics, have played a prominent role in keeping this desire alive.58 India’s role
with regard to the ‘Tamil question’ (i.e. the issue of autonomy for the Tamil commu-
nity in Sri Lanka), a question which is still not resolved, remains a basis of this antag-
onism. Another theory that could explain the Sinhala community’s strong engagement
with the Ravana narrative was presented by leading artist and academic Jagath
Weerasinghe at a cultural event in Colombo in February 2016.59 Commenting on the
contemporary Sinhala community’s mass interest in Ravana, Weerasinghe identified
the claim by the Tamil separatist movement to declare the northeast region of the
island as the traditional homeland of the Sri Lankan Tamils as the factor that triggered
the re-emergence of the Ravana narrative in recent times. Weerasinghe was of the
opinion that the theory of the traditional homeland of the Tamils demanded from the
Sinhalese a ‘better’ story than the Vijaya narrative in order to counter the Tamil claim
to a homeland. Even though both these theories provide valid explanations for the
Sinhalese interest in Hela Ravana, they still do not explain why this explosion of inter-
est happened now and not earlier. Antagonism towards India has been a regular feature
of Sri Lankan politics, the history of which goes back at least to the last century, and
the desire for an independent Sinhalese past was present at least from Hela Havula
times. The claim for a traditional Tamil homeland is also nothing new, having been
part of the discourse of the Tamil struggle for quite some time; as suggested by
Weerasinghe, it was being put forward at least from the 1950s.
It is possible to argue that the new sources of information that strengthened the
Hela Ravana discourse made the difference. Even though one can see the recent surge
in Hela discourse on Ravana as a continuation of the Hela Havula discourse on the ori-
gin of the Sinhala nation, there are clear differences between the two projects when it
comes to their popularity among the general public and their ability to spread across
different layers of society.60 While Hela Havula was mainly a literary exercise confined

58. Antagonism towards India represents a regular feature of Sinhala nationalism. Anti-Indian sentiment against
Indian migrants ran high during the mid 1930s, resulting in a legal dispute with India over the citizenship status
of upcountry Tamils that endured into the 1960s. See Wickramasinghe, Sri Lanka in the Modern Age, pp. 127,
179; and Valli Kanapathipillai, Citizenship and Statelessness in Sri Lanka: The Case of the Tamil Estate Workers
(New York: Anthem Press, 2009), p. 68. Indian expansionism was one of the key theories around which the
radical Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) organised, resulting in a failed rebellion against the Sri Lankan govern-
ment in 1971. See A.C. Alles, Insurgency—1971 (Colombo: The Colombo Apothecaries, 1976). Sinhalese anti-
Indian opinion reached a peak during 1980s, firstly as a result of Indian training provided to Tamil militants
who led an armed struggle against the Sinhalese government in the north, and then because the Colombo gov-
ernment was forced to sign a peace accord with India which resulted in Indian army forces being sent to the
island as peace-keepers to maintain peace between the Sri Lankan armed forces and the LTTE.
59. Weerasinghe expressed these views while introducing the Werner Herzog film, Cave of Forgotten Dreams, at the
Foundation Institute Sri Lanka on 19 Feb. 2016.
60. There are clear differences between the two projects when it comes to their objectives, leading commentators,
audiences, contents and modes of spread. While the main objective of Hela Havula remained the purification of
the Sinhala language from the influences particularly of Indian languages, the current discourse expects to
replace the Mahavamsa narrative as the history of the Sinhala nation with the narrative of Ravana. In contrast
to the Hela Havula approach of moving to confrontation with the power elite of Sinhala society, the
commentators of the contemporary Ravana discourse were in favour of maintaining cordial relationships with
the leadership of the Sinhala polity. The low-caste factor that acted as a barrier to the campaign by Hela
Havula is not visible in the contemporary project.
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 13

to a segment of the educated middle class of Sinhala society, the current Ravana dis-
course seems to have rapidly caught the popular imagination of the Sinhala community
through its spread in all popular media such as newspapers, tabloids, books, novels,
radio, television and the internet. Freely circulating claims regarding the advanced sci-
ence and engineering of the Ravana dynasty have made the discourse particularly
attractive. The reinterpretation of archaeological ruins to fit the Ravana narrative has
injected credibility into an otherwise mythical story. In the 1980s, in his seminal work,
The Cult of Goddess Pattini, Gananath Obeyesekere identified attempts like these to
rationalise myths by providing ‘proofs’ of them by coining the term ‘demythicization’.61
Commentaries on the Vargapurnikava add an element of authenticity to the narrative
of Ravana which otherwise depends heavily on sources that cannot be claimed as Sri
Lankan. Among many others I identify as key contributors to the cause are Sooriya
Gunasekara (who has written extensively about the advances of science and engineer-
ing during the Ravana dynasty), Gayan Sandakelum (producer of the popular television
programme, Helawanshaya, which devoted time to following the historical landmarks
of the Ravana story) and Thero Manewe Vimalaratana (who has published commenta-
ries on the Vargapurnikava as the custodian of the ola leaf manuscript). The combined
efforts of these three, in my opinion, have helped in developing the basic features of
the contemporary Ravana narrative that appeals in different ways to diverse segments
of Sinhala society and have been reproduced in the public sphere.
I would also argue, however, that a rupture in the mytho-historiographical imagin-
ation that suspended the ordered arrangement of the narremes from which the history
of the Sinhala people has been constructed was prompted by another factor. A careful
look at the recent Ravana surge shows that it overlaps with the years leading to the
defeat of the LTTE in the decades-long war between the Tamil militants and
the Sinhalese government. Some of the material that can be shown as evidence for the
spread of the Ravana narrative (for example, from books and series of newspaper
articles to series of radio and television programmes to university course units on
popular history) was produced or introduced during the final stages of the war when
the LTTE began to weaken (the years leading up to 2009), with the majority coming
after the end of the war in May 2009. Sinhala nationalism, the driving force behind the
Sri Lankan government’s war effort, appeared to reach a peak with the defeat of the
LTTE. The Mahavamsa history, with its messy links to India, and the myth of
Sinhalese origin from Vijaya, whose aristocratic lineage was challenged by many, start-
ing with the Hela Havula group, became inadequate as a history for the Sinhalese after
the victory against the LTTE. The defeat of the LTTE was so significant an achievement
for the Sinhalese in general, and the governing regime in particular, that they believed
they deserved a better, grander history. The victory against the LTTE provided a boost
to confidence desperately needed by a nation that had nothing significant to claim
except the glory of the ancient Sinhalese kingdoms’ irrigation civilisation. The govern-
ment’s propaganda, disseminated through all channels of the state media, reached its
apogee after the defeat of the LTTE, portraying Sri Lanka as a great nation and its
leader, President Mahinda Rajapaksa, as one of the great leaders of the world.

61. See Gananath Obeyesekere, The Cult of Goddess Pattini (Chicago, IL/London: The University of Chicago Press,
1984), pp. 378–9.
14 D. WITHARANA

The Ravana narrative, telling of the technologically advanced Hela nation extending its
influence across the Earth and even beyond, and with Ravana as its mighty leader, fit-
ted well with the self-generated greatness of the post-2009 Sinhala nation. In contrast
to the technological achievements of the ancient Sinhalese described in the Vijaya nar-
rative that are confined to the achievements of an agriculturally-advanced civilisation,
the engineering accomplishments of the Ravana dynasty in an array of fields, including
air travel, space travel, naval expeditions and the use of nuclear energy, have placed the
technological developments of the Helas on par with the technical expertise of the glo-
bal superpowers of the modern-day world. It is due to a long-felt desire for an inde-
pendent past with no links to India, and a relatively long-felt need for the Sinhalese to
be able to claim their right to the entire island, that the twenty-first-century Ravana
‘moment’ emerged with the overlapping factors that have surfaced recently—the avail-
ability of sub-narratives of Hela Ravana in different modes of communication, and the
wish for a better history after the defeat of the LTTE.
The attempt to replace the official past of the Sinhala nation (i.e. the Vijaya narra-
tive) with the Hela Ravana narrative raises interesting questions. The perception of a
nation which is mobilised on the basis of its glorious past could be considered unstable
at a time when the said past of the nation, the main guideline for defining national
identity, is contested by another past. An attempt to give up the past of a nation for a
past that is radically different to the previous one is, hence, a risky exercise from the
point of view of the stability of the nation. As Michael Billig has pointed out, nations
need to be reproduced on a daily basis under normal circumstances.62 Reminding the
citizenry of its existing unique past on a regular basis is a part of this process of repro-
duction of a nation. The Ravana ‘moment’ in the early twenty-first century motivates
one to revisit this general wisdom. Even though a nation is generally situated on the
basis of a shared national past (or future), I would argue that a nation can have its own
existence, its own life, independent of its past at certain rare moments when the nation
is at peak confidence.63 The success of the war against the LTTE, considered one of the
most powerful guerrilla movements in the world, and the ultimate victory in 2009 pro-
vided the Sinhala nation with such a moment in the history of the nation in which the
enemy, the Tamil ‘other’, was ‘disappeared’ from the national landscape (at least for a
short period of time). With the absence of an ‘enemy’, the need to strictly guard the
mainstream Sinhala history provided by the Vijaya narrative seems to have been
relaxed or was even absent. It is a rare moment during which a nation can afford to
replace a past with a new past.

Coda: The future of Hela Ravana

One might have expected the fall of the Rajapaksa regime in the presidential elections
of January 2015 to have been fatal to the Hela Ravana movement. After relative silence
during the months after the election, however, an increasing number of posts on social
media began to appear, making familiar references to Ravana as an ancient Sinhala

62. Michael Billig, Banal Nationalism (London: Sage, 1995).

63. See B.D. Witharana, ‘Negotiating Power and Constructing the Nation: Engineering in Sri Lanka’, PhD dissertation,
Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands, 2018, pp. 152–8.
 SOUTH ASIA: JOURNAL OF SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES 15

hero. Bookstalls in Colombo continue to display new books on Ravana published since
2015, along with reprints of older books. I met several groups of people in 2016 who
claimed to be working clandestinely to ‘further research’ and propagate knowledge
developed by the ‘Ravana tradition’ in the spheres of medicine, agriculture and energy.

Acknowledgements
I am thankful to Prof. Nira Wickramasinghe for the guidance provided when ‘Ravana’s Sri
Lanka’ was at the initial stage of development as a PhD dissertation chapter. I would like to
extend my heartfelt gratitude to the guest editors of this special section, Prof. Sree Padma Holt
and, especially, Dr. Justin W. Henry for the editorial work done. I would also like to thank
very much the anonymous reviewers for South Asia for their useful and valuable comments.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.