{"id":71852,"date":"2021-02-11T19:04:20","date_gmt":"2021-02-12T00:04:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=71852"},"modified":"2021-02-11T19:05:33","modified_gmt":"2021-02-12T00:05:33","slug":"though-prime-minister-mahinda-rajapaksa-said-burials-of-covid-victims-will-be-permitted-state-minister-dr-sudharshini-fernandopulle-saysthe-decision-on-the-matter-would-be-made-by-a-technical-comm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=71852","title":{"rendered":"Though Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa Stated  Burials  of COVID Victims Will be Permitted, State  Minister Dr. Sudharshini Fernandopulle Says  the decision on the matter would be made by a technical committee that comes under the Ministry of Health."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>There was confusion in Parliament yesterday over the Government\u2019s position regarding its policy on mandatory cremation of COVID-19 victims after State Minister of Primary Health Services, Pandemics and COVID Prevention Sudharshini Fernandopulle, said that the decision on the matter would be made by a technical committee that comes under the Ministry of Health.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Health Ministry does not take personal decisions on policy matter, but it is done through a technical committee. We have to present this to the technical committee, and we will have to act according to their decision,\u201d Fernandopulle said, a day after Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa told the House that the Government would allow burials. The State Minister made the remark after SJB MP Mujibur Rahuman asked when the government was planning to issue the Gazette notification revoking its cremation-only policy.<\/p>\n<p>Following Fernandopulle\u2019s comments SJB MP Rauff Hakeem questioned as to who in the \u201cso-called\u201d expert committee was blocking this.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201cYesterday the Prime Minister made a very categorical statement that burials will be permitted. I said this is a better late than never, mature decision by a mature leader. He understands not only the predicament of minorities but how it\u2019s affecting reconciliation in the country. This is causing unnecessary racial tensions in the country and we are dragging the whole country into a total abyss by this conduct,\u201d Hakeem said.<\/p>\n<p>He said the issue had been going back and forth repeatedly to a committee full of pseudo-scientists.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Justice Minister Ali Sabry knows that Muslims on both sides have been agitating for this, and finally the Prime Minister has given a solemn undertaking in this House. Who is better than the Prime Minister to decide on this for the government? The government must not drag its feet on this issue, which has now gone to Geneva \u2013 and none of us want this to happen. Please take a mature and considerate decision, and do not insult the Prime Minister for God\u2019s sake,\u201d Hakeem said.<\/p>\n<p><em>Courtesy:Daily FT<\/em><\/p>\n<div id=\"tweetbutton71852\" class=\"tw_button\" style=\"float:right;margin-left:10px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdbsjeyaraj.com%2Fdbsj%2F%3Fp%3D71852&amp;text=Though%20Prime%20Minister%20Mahinda%20Rajapaksa%20Stated%20%20Burials%20%20of%20COVID%20Victims%20Will%20be%20Permitted%2C%20State%20%20Minister...%20&amp;related=&amp;lang=en&amp;count=horizontal\" class=\"twitter-share-button\"  style=\"width:55px;height:22px;background:transparent url('https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-tweet-button\/tweetn.png') no-repeat  0 0;text-align:left;text-indent:-9999px;display:block;\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There was confusion in Parliament yesterday over the Government\u2019s position regarding its policy on mandatory cremation of COVID-19 victims after State Minister of Primary Health Services, Pandemics and COVID Prevention Sudharshini Fernandopulle, said that the decision on the matter would be made by a technical committee that comes under the Ministry of Health. \u201cThe Health &#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=71852\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading &lsquo;Though Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa Stated  Burials  of COVID Victims Will be Permitted, State  Minister Dr. Sudharshini Fernandopulle Says  the decision on the matter would be made by a technical committee that comes under the Ministry of Health.&rsquo; &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71852"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=71852"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71854,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71852\/revisions\/71854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=71852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=71852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=71852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}