GALLERY OF EVENTS - OBA AGM and Re-Union Feb 2007

Wanni & Jacques

Shervon & Bandu

Mahen & Wanni

Rizvi, Mahen, Wanni, Raj Mohan & Shervon

Wimale & Mahen

Panini, Bandu & Rizvi

Rizvi & Raj Mohan

Vinod practicing for the Match

Ranjith , Herby, Sanath J, Shervon and Hermon

Bandu, SJ, Hermon & Kuru

Rizvi & Sumedha

Punyananda & B Muna

Sanath J, Shervon& Hermon.

Ranjith , Herby, and Bandu

The Band

Old Boys Enjoying themselves

Mrs.K K , Wanni, LJ, Ranjith & Mahi

Sumedha

Cricket Match in Progress

Prabath Jayasundera with his friends

At the AGM Head Table – B Muna, Chandana & Mahen

Shervon

Shervon , B Muna, Chandana & Mahen

A section of the Old Boys at the AGM (01)

A section of the Old Boys at the AGM (02)

A section of the Old Boys at the AGM (03)

A section of the Old Boys at the AGM (04)

A section of the Old Boys at the AGM (05)

Jacques addresses the Old Boys

SJ, Herby, B Muna after the AGM

The New Ex-Co

The Band

OBA AGM & Re-Union February 2007

The Re-Union Celebrations were held during the weekend, February 23-25, 2007, at STC Gurutalawa, with the AGM on Saturday, 24, at 6.30 pm, attended by 73 Members. The following Members were elected uncontested to the Ex-Co.

Senior Vice President Mr. Mahen Ranasinghe
Vice Presidents Mr. N.D.U. Kuru Utumpala,
Mr. S. Rajmohan
Mr. Chandana De Silva
Secretary Mr. Shervon Fernando
Treasurer Mr. Ranjit Lowe
Asst. Secretary Mr. Athula Kumaranayake
Asst. Treasurer Mr. Nihal Wanniarachchi
Members Mr. Anil Wickremaratne, Mr. Buddhika Kurukularatne, Mr.A.C.M.Rashid, Mr. Panini Edirisinhe, Mr. Wansapriya Gunaseela,, Mr. Kenneth Gurusinghe, Mr. S. Suresh Kumar, Mr. P. Dhayabaran, Mr. S. Kaviharan, Mr. Pubudu Gunasekera

At the first Ex-Co Meeting of 2007/2008, held on March 13, 2007, the following Members were appointed.
Brig. Bandu Munasinghe ) Co-opted under Rule 9(2) b
Mr. P.J.Fernando ) -- do --
Mr. Rizvi Jalill ) -- do --
Mr. Hermon Fernando ) -- do --
Lt. Col. Harin Walgama ) -- do --
Mr. Sumedha Perera ) Appointed under Rule 9(3)

The cricket match, Old Boys vs. Present Boys was the main feature on Saturday morning, followed by the usual dip in the pool, to wet themselves outside, having already been quite wet inside, at the festivities at the grounds.

Mr. Mahen Ranasinghe had returned to Sri Lanka after two years and as mentioned in the Notice of the AGM, he took charge of the food at the Re-Union Celebrations to satisfy those who had complained heavily about the fare provided in the previous two years. The menus included, buriyani, tandoori chicken, fish ambulthiyal, tempered/fried dry fish as specialties, never served in the past, along with a variety of vegetables, salads and the traditional dhal curry and pol sambol. Kiribath and string hoppers were additions to the normal bread and pol sambol breakfast. Dessert included watalappan, jelly, fruit salad with ice cream, bananas (kolikuttu, seeni kesel and ambul) and pineapple. Boiled and tempered gram and devilled chicken, were served as bites at the cricket match and the Fellowship on Saturday evening. Saturday afternoon tea included patties, cakes and fish rolls. “5 star hotel food” was the general comment heard everywhere.

Newsletter No.11
March 2007

AGM 2007

Secretary’s Report

Re-Union Celebrations 2006
The Cricket Match was the main feature of the Saturday morning and as usual, the Old Boys had a festive approach to it. They had their fun while the match was on and the band provided the music at the required tempo to add to the fun. After the match, almost everyone had a dip in the swimming pool. A volleyball match was played with the minor staff later on and it provided much fun and entertainment.

Annual general Meeting
AGM was held on 25th February 2006 at 8.30 pm, with the Headmaster, Mr. Gladwyn Canagasabey in the chair. Dr. David Ponniah, Warden STC, Mt. Lavinia, and patron of the OBA was also present. The new Ex-Co was elected and the meeting adjourned at 8.00 p.m. Old Boys Fellowship followed immediately afterwards and it was nice to see the young and old get together.

Special General Meeting
A Special General Meeting was held on 1st March 2006 at 6 p.m. with Dr. David Ponniah, Warden STC, Mt. Lavinia and Patron of the OBA, in the chair. He called upon His Worship, the Bishop Duleep de Chickera, Chairman, Board of Governors to address the meeting. His Worship traced the history of the problem that had beset STC, Gurutalawa and indicated that the downward trend had actually started after the assassination of the then headmaster in 1989. He said that everyone from the Board of Governors and below in the hierarchy, had not addressed the problem in time and the past recriminations would not serve any purpose in reviving Gurutalawa. He indicated that some measures had been put in place to relieve the situation but it had to be a ‘wait and see’ situation of how the situation would improve in the course of the year. He considered that a review of the start realities would have to be addressed as things moved on.

Current Situation at Gurutalawa
With the uncertainties that existed at the College during the year, the Ex-Co decided to keep a low profile and build up funds for any future eventuality. The workshop to discuss the possibilities of revitalizing the affairs of Guru was conducted by His Holiness, the Bishop and it was attended by few members of the OBA, the parents, teachers and well-wishers.

The Headmaster, Mr. Gladwyn Canagasabey, resigned at the end of January this year, to take up an appointment as Vice Principal, Trinity College, Kandy. We wish him well in his new endeavour. Mr. Jacques Huyghebaert, originally from Belgium, currently living in Sri Lanka has come to the help of the College and he is now seriously involved with the administration at Gurutalawa. All those who attend Re-Union Celebrations will have the opportunity to meet him.

A task force has been formed with His Holiness, the Bishop Duleep De Chickera, as Chairman with several Members of the Board of Governors, Mr. Jacques Huyghebaert and the Senior Vice President of the OBA, to address the problems and develop the College, hopefully to bring it back to its old glory.

Our Website : www.stcguru.com
Mr. Muditha Dissanayake continued to maintain and update the website started in 2003, in spite of the commitments in the UK, in studies and employment, and the OBA expresses its grateful thanks to him.

Generosity of the OBA Melbourne Branch
The established link with the OBA Melbourne, Australia Branch was further strengthened by the promised gift from that Branch to our OBA, of Rs.31,788.65 and Rs.120,000.00 from Mr. Edouard Rowlands. We are grateful to them for these donations.

Fellowship Get-together - 2006
The Fellowship Get-together on Sunday, 24th September 2006 at Wadduwa Holiday Resort was organized by Col. Walgama and his small team. It was well organized and over 150 were present. Everybody enjoyed it thoroughly and our thanks are due to the organizers.

Out of the outstanding amount of Rs.20,000, Rs.6,000 has been collected reducing the outstanding amount to Rs.14,000.00

All Thomian Cricket Tournament – 2007
The first ever All Thomian Cricket Tournament organized by The Old Boys’ Association of S. Thomas’ College, Mt. Lavinia, Gurutalawa, Bandarawela, and The Old Boys’ Union of S. Thomas’ Preparatory School, Kollupitiya was successfully held on January 7, 2006 at 10.00 a.m. at the big club grounds of S. Thomas’ College, Mt. Lavinia.

STC, Gurutalawa OBA Team consisted of Vijaya Mendis, Mujitha Mauranath, Ramesh Perera, Ajith Sirisena, Athula Jayasundera, Prasaj Kumar, Eranga Peiris, Indika Senaratne, Faiz Mohomed, Danushka Daswatte, Dushantha Dharmawardena, Rasika Fernando, Sumedha Perera and Dilan Amarasuriya.

We beat Bandarawela and entered the finals. We gave Mount quite a scare with an opening partnership of 65 runs in 6.2 overs before getting beaten. Most of our batsmen were caught at the boundary line, keeping to the 6 runs or get out attitude of Guru.

1st Match was Bandarawela Vs Gurutalawa – Bandarawela batted first getting out for 92 runs. Gurutalawa scored 93 runs for no wicket in 6.1 overs. Mount Vs Guru – Mount scored 174 runs for 4 wickets in 15 overs. Gurutalawa were all out for 103 losing by 71 runs. Faiz Mohamed was the Man of the Tournament. I take this opportunity to sincerely thank all the participants and the supports who graced this occasion. The event was definitely a great success.

Membership
Twenty Eight Old Boys joined the OBA during the year. They are; C.P. Weerasinghe, Wansariya Gunaseela, Nagitha Gunaseela, D.L.N. Jayawardana, D.L.U.N.U. Jayawardena, A.I. Rahim Adam, Jayanth Sellahewa, Rohan Palletenna, A.H.M. Rushan, W.G.A. Botejue, D.K. Perera, M.H.M.N. Ameer, Hareen Walgama, D.M. Dassanayake, K.G.S. Ratnasekera, Ramanathan Shanmuganathan, G.D. Upul, P. Wicramasinghe, Sanjeewa Deshappriya, S.K. Bopitiya, R. Dinesh Ravindran, Selvarasu Kaviharan, K. Selvendran, N.M.A. Imran, R.D. Wijetunga, P. Sanath Pathirana, Sureshkumar Shanmugalingam, and L. Omar.

Ex-Co Meetings
Regular Meetings of the Committee were held, including one at Gurutalawa. The Meeting held at Gurutalawa was well attended.

We are very grateful to Mr. Y. Casiechetty, Headmaster, STC, Kollupitiya for his unstinted support in making available a classroom every time we requested for his assistance, to hold our Committee Meetings. We thank him profusely.

Our Donors
We are very grateful to the following who have for the past few years contributed by Banks order, monthly, quarterly or bi-annually.
Mr. S.K. Wickremasinghe Rs.6,000.00
Mr. Falil Caffoor Rs.3,600.00
Mr. J.O. Yatawara Rs.4,200.00
Mr. L.G.S. Goonawardena Rs. 300.00 and
Mr. Sisira Nanayakkara for regular remittances.

ESTO PERPETUA

Shervon Fernando
Hony Secretary

Secretary's Report AGM 2007