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Although a Sinhala Buddhist, Mahinda Rajapaksa has been influenced by Hindu traditions and practices, and makes regular visits to South Indian temples like the Venkateswara temple in Tirupati and Tirumala temple in Chittoor.
His wife, Shiranthi Rajapaksa, visited a Hindu temple in Sri Lanka just last week in search of divine intervention, amid the family’s bid to retain power.
Gnana Akka, Mahinda’s ‘personal shaman’, was reportedly tasked with charming demonstrators at the GotaGoGama protest site at Colombo’s Galle Face. To carry out this onerous task, Gnana Akka “charmed tonnes of bottled water” that were then delivered as refreshments to the demonstrators in the hope that it would “break the spell of dissent” they were under. According to reports, flowers were imported from India to be used as part of the ritual to charm the bottled water.
What seems to have rankled Mahinda is that demonstrators have picked up on these rituals to make their point.
A trend has emerged in Sri Lanka in recent days of protesters performing rituals part of traditional Sinhala Buddhist funerals in Mahinda Rajapaksa’s “honour”. Many have even sent condolences to him and his son, former sports minister Namal Rajapaksa.
Social media users have also taken to performing superstitious rituals to mock the Rajapaksas, like circulating poems that bring evil to them, and posting pictures of ground chillies at midnight — an act associated with the occult practice of casting a curse.
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