13th amendment picked from Indian constitution: Sri Lankan CJ

T V Sriram

Colombo, June 6 (PTI) The outgoing Sri Lankan Chief
Justice has warned that the 13th amendment to provide
devolution of power to the Tamils in the North was not
practical as it was a "hurriedly pieced together" document
'picked' from the Indian constitution.

"It is impossible to devolve police and land powers
fully in a small island nation like Sri Lanka," Sarath Nanda
Silva told reporters, Friday.

"For instance, Uttar Pradesh or Madhya Pradesh in
India is ten to twelve times bigger than Sri Lanka. The
devolution of police and land powers is prudent and successful
in those states, but won't be so in Sri Lanka," he said.

The District Development Council system that existed
during the J R Jayewardene regime was probably the most
suitable system to devolve power to the periphery in a country
like Sri Lanka," the Chief Justice of the Sri Lankan Supreme
Court said.

On the The 13th Amendment to the Constitution he said
it was not practicable.

At his last official press briefing, he described that
Amendment "as ill-conceived and hurriedly pieced together by
picking bits and pieces of the Indian Constitution" in keeping
with the Indo-Lanka Accord of 1987. PTI