When all that is solid melts

"...economy is embedded in nature and cannot exist apart from it,” World Bank Reboot Development The Economics of a Liveable Planet

- BY TISARANEE GUNASEKARA

Preventing future tragedies depends on more than restoring water and electricity and rebuilding roads

IN September 2020, a five-storied house in Buwelikada, Kandy, collapsed, killing three people. The victims were neighbours in a house below, a young couple and their infant daughter. Public outcry and demands by the Bar Association (one of the victims was a lawyer) compelled the police to act. The owner of the house, Anura Lewke, a former Basnayake Nilame of the Dodanwala Natha Devalaya, was arrested and remanded.

According to media reports, Lewke's house had been built over a stream flowing down to the Udawattakale Sanctuary. As the NBRO (National Building Research Organisation) pointed out in its preliminary report, "Existing surface and subsurface drainage systems have been blocked by the construction of the building and the other structures in the vicinity..." (https://www.nbro.gov.lk/images/special_projects/ BUWELIKADA/PRELIMINARYINVESTIGATION-REPORT-ONBUILDING-COLLAPSE.pdf). Moreover, the initial permission had been for a two-story structure. Three more levels were added in stages, turning the house into a death trap, not for the owners who escaped in time, but for three innocents.

The tragedy brought to limelight a problem which lies at the intersection of economics, environment and the rule of law illegal and unsafe constructions, by the poor and the rich, from shacks to multi-story apartment complexes, eating into hillsides, wetlands, and river reservations. The NBRO announced it was conducting a survey to identify illegal constructions in Kandy together with the Municipal Council. It subse quently stated that it has identified high risk areas in the Central Province for landslides and was preparing a proposal to deal with buildings in those areas, from tuition classes to residences and hotels. That was that.