In Sri Lanka, teachers resist Bill ‘militarising’ education

University teachers held silent protest across campuses on the island.

Academics from Sri Lanka’s state universities on Wednesday withdrew from online teaching and administrative duties in resistance to a government Bill that, they say, threatens to “militarise” education. University teachers also held a silent protest across campuses on the island, according to Harshana Rambukwella, a spokesman for the Federation of University Teachers Associations’ (FUTA) campaign against the General Sir John Kotelawala National Defence University (or KDU) Bill. “The FUTA’s main demand is that the government keep military and civilian education separate,” Prof. Rambukwella said. “This Bill is not just about one university, it is essentially a model of private education, subsidised by the government and run by the military. It is an assault on the country’s public education system,” he said.