Kumarathungu Bathi Geeya Lyrics by Sunil Santha

O Kumaratunga, to you my head
I bow this day
I bow this day in devotion
I bow this day

Setting the power of ripe knowledge over all the Hela
cutting away the jungle that had buried the truth of the language
raising a thousand lamps of inquiry, searching high and low
destroying delusion, lifting up our worth

O great departed teacher
O departed lord of words
O departed true hero
my guru, my deity

Bound in the chains of foreign tongues and their grammar
tormented, our words sunk in the mud of corrupted meaning
you raised and nourished the Mother Hela tongue that could not move
feeding it courage and life, and setting it on the road of progress

O great departed teacher
O departed lord of words
O departed true hero
my guru, my deity

Drawing on the learning of Guttila, the boldness of Kashyapa
loving the poetry of Parakrama and the deeds of Gemunu
studying many other verses of wonder and marvel
you left in the world a name: “the great Hela one”

O great departed teacher
O departed lord of words
O departed true hero
my guru, my deity

This is a song of homage to Kumaratunga Munidasa, the towering scholar, poet and language reformer who, in the early twentieth century, led the Hela Havula movement to purify and revive the Sinhala, or “Hela,” language and restore the self-respect of the Sinhala people under colonial rule. The words are by his own disciple, the poet Arisen Ahubudu, and the singer bows to him “in devotion,” calling him “my guru, my deity.”

The praise is specific and heartfelt. Kumaratunga is remembered for “cutting away the jungle that had buried the truth of the language,” for raising “a thousand lamps of inquiry” in his tireless research, and for “destroying delusion” and “lifting up our worth.” In an age when the mother tongue lay “bound in the chains of foreign grammar,” its words “sunk in the mud of corrupted meaning,” he “raised and nourished the Mother Hela tongue that could not move,” giving it “courage and life” and setting it back on the path of progress.

The last verse roots his achievement in the deep Sinhala past, invoking the literary and heroic glories he loved and drew upon, the learning of the Guttila poem, the boldness of King Kashyapa, the poetry of Parakramabahu, the deeds of Dutugemunu, so that he earned in the world the name “the great Hela one.” Each verse ends by mourning him as “the great departed teacher, the departed lord of words, the departed true hero.” What the listener is left with is a nation’s gratitude to the man who gave it back its language and its pride, remembered not merely as a scholar but as a guru worthy of worship.