Teaching of Dhamma in Tamil language is praised by the Most Venerable Trincomalee

The Most Venerable Mahanayake Thero of the Lanka Amarapura Dharma Rakshitha Nikaya, Aggamaha Panditha, Rajakeeya Panditha Sastrapati, the Incumbent of Bambalapitiya Vajiraramaya,Venerable Trincomalee Ananda Maha Thero visited the Peliyagoda Vidyalankara Pirivena on April 9 to review the progress of the Tamil language education programme conducted by the Dharmavijaya Foundation.

The Tamil language education programme, which began about 2 months ago with 31 student monks with the full approval of the Most Venerable Velamitiyawe Sri Gnanarathana Thero, the Parivenadhipathi of the Peliyagoda Vidyalankara, is currently being carried out as a very effective national mission, providing the opportunity for monks living far away to connect online. The main objective of the course to train monks to deliver sermons in Tamil, initiated under the auspices of the Dharmavijaya Foundation, is to eliminate language barriers and misunderstandings in order to establish national reconciliation, which is an essential factor for the development of the country, and to establish a society that upholds the precepts and develops values in humans by turning the concept of developing the country by developing the human being, which was a concept of the late Venerable Madihe Pangna Seeha Maha Thera, into a practical programme. Another main objective of this educational programme is to popularise Buddhist philosophy, which will build long-term reconciliation among the communities in the country which may gain great fame for our motherland internationally.

The course is being conducted with the resourceful contribution of the Deputy Director of the National Institute of Education, His Excellency Rajakeeya Pandith Radaliyadde Seelananda Thero and Tamil language scholar Professor Vajira Prabhath Wijesinghe. The Tamil course has been planned for a full year and special attention has been paid to developing language skills based on preaching the Dhamma in Tamil. Speaking first, Assistant Director of the Pirivena Division of the Ministry of Education, Mr. Dhammika Lalith, stated that it is the policy of the current government to promote inter-ethnic harmony, which is an essential factor for the development of the country, and that the people of the South, including the Maha Sangha, were unable to communicate properly with the people of the North and East, and therefore had to face a 30-year war.

Although the Tamil Language Programme, which is a national and social service, is a mission that should be carried out by the Ministry of Education or Buddhist Religious Affairs; the Assistant Director Dhammika expressed the gratitude of the Ministry of Education to Dharmavijaya foundation for initiating such a great mission that provides permanent solutions to a fundamental problem of the country. He stated that facilities have been provided for admission to the University of Jaffna for higher education in the Tamil language, opening doors to higher levels of academic excellence, and that student monks will be qualified for the current vacancies for Tamil language teachers in Pirivena educational institutions.