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Other than Manila, no Asian city takes Christmas as seriously as Colombo. Some traditions are dying and new ones are emerging. As many migrate, armed with milk wine, salt beef, and figgy pudding, Burgher aunties and uncles fight the good fight to preserve the best of Christmas past.

By clothing the presidency in such overmighty power, J.R.'s constitution magnified folly into catastrophe. Black July, the referendum that made a mockery of democracy, Indian intervention, all the way to Gota’s disastrous economic collapse — all bore the imprint of unchecked authority.

Despite Supreme Court judgements against them, torturers remain in police service, and sometimes even get promoted. Neither the police department nor the national police commission takes discipline seriously.

Marxists commanding a capitalist economy, sluggish growth supporting precocious human development, and rentiers relying on Gulf remittances. No, this isn’t Lanka. It’s Kerala, as sketched-out by Tirthankar Roy and K. Ravi Raman in their new economic history of Kerala.