Ancient Flag of Sri Lanka 

By Charles.S.Perera

The Hela flag had been prepared when there was one people in Lanka the Helayas.   There were of course the other clans such as the Nagas and the Yaksas.  But there were no Tamils and Muslims.  It may have been prepared by the Buddhist Monks.

Every one may have believed that the lion in the flag represent the  Hela people.  That was why the Tamil and Muslim parliamentarians demanded the Orange and Green stripes not to be left out leaving the whole flag for the Sinhala lion. Our Sinhala politicians gave in. Recently even  Maithripala Sirisena gave into the Tamils asking them to sing the National Anthem in Tamil. Rajitha Senaratne said that having heard the Sinahala National Anthem sung in Tamil he was so pleased that his body hair stood straight.

That was how our Hela heritage had been distorted and sold the National Anthem for a few votes.

The Tamil terrorist Prabhakaran thought that the lion in the  flag represented Sinhala people and he adopted the tiger head to represent the Tamil people- it is sadly the separated head of the tiger in a circle of  bullets which is on the blood red tiger flag representing brutality, ruthlessness, with the bullets representing their lack of courage. But the lion flag has a full bodied lion strong and fearless.

But the lion on the Hela flag does not  represent the Hela people, nor the sword cruelty or the bo leaves their religion.

The Sword stands for Justice, the Lion the King and the Tail the people. The sword, the head of the lion and the tail should be at the same level, meaning that the King meets out justice to every one equally. The back ground is not blood red it is colour the of the earth and yellow stands for peace.  The four bo-leaves represent Loving Kindness, Compassion, Sympathetic Joy, and Equanimity.

Mr. A.T.Ariyaratne of Sarvodaya says that the Sword represents righteousness, and the three feet of the lion firmly on ground represents annicca, dukkha and Anatma