A devastating cyclone sat stationary above the entire island of Sri Lanka and deluged it for two full days on November 27, 2025. Some 20% of the land mass was affected by massive floods and landslides that buried villages, homes and people. Roads, railways and bridges were impassable. Hundreds of people died and many more lost their livelihoods.
The effect was most severe in the hill-country, in villages around the city of Kandy. Most of our IP Teams are located in the villages and tea estates in that area. Many IP Team members had their homes damaged or destroyed and were displaced. The displacement broke up the village-based IP Teams. Fifty six Home Gardening Projects and community farms which the Sri Lankan IP Teams worked hard to build and had became a life-line of food security for the families were destroyed. Many were relocated to a tent city.
One IP team discovered that many of their members were in the same tent city, and began to organize.The facilities in the tents were inadequate. The people were told to go return to their unstable houses daily to quickly cook their meals, use the toilets and return. The government promised them new houses, but several months later, nothing was happening.
This is when the IP Team sprung into action.
They got together with others in the tent city and strategized. Everyone in the tent city had a shared self-interest. Under the leadership of Mr. Palanivel, the IP Team leader and Ms. Devi, our community organizer, they planned an agitation on the District Secretariat. They recruited Mr. Dharmasena, who had previously had success with this government office. When the government officer saw Dharmasena, he told them to get rid of him because “he’s a troublemaker!” But they persisted, and got the district secretariat to move on the matter.
Many in the IP Team believe that the government’s deliberate slowness to give them the necessary aid is because they are “estate Tamils” (a traditionally marginalized community). Their ancestors were brought to Sri Lanka from South India, centuries ago to work as indentured workers in the tea estates. Even today, the are the lowest paid workers in the country.
Now, ten months later, they are in small houses built by the government. The houses are inadequate and hurriedly built. They don’t have electricity or adequate water. But the government has given them solar lamps for the time being. However, they delight in their victory.
Now with greater power and confidence, they are demanding from the estate, a small building, for the purpose of a childcare center. One of the IP Team members is a qualified child-care provider and she is willing to care for the children, so that mothers could leave their children there and go to work. Now that they won a big victory of getting the houses, they feel this would be easier to accomplish.