Caritas Helps Plantation Workers Obtain Documents

(December 27, 2008) Caritas Kandy-SETIK (Social and Economic Training Institute Kandy) had organized a gathering of plantation workers with the local birth registrar on Dec. 10 in Ambagamuwa, a hill village near Kandy, 115 kilometres northeast of Colombo. The event was organized to coincide with International Human Rights Day. According to government regulations, parents must register the name of their newborn child within three months and obtain a birth certificate. If they fail to do so, registration later can be involved and time-consuming. The lack of a birth certificate could deny a full education, the right to vote and the chance to get a proper job. A birth certificate is also needed before an adult can apply for an identity card, which is needed for travel. Caritas workers and priests helped people fill in forms about the birth and then translated all their statements into Sinhalese for the registrar. The Kandy diocesan priest told UCA News the state system remains beyond the reach of most plantation workers. He put this down to workers' negligence, ignorance or fear of bureaucracy. Life is typically confined to the plantation, with education limited to an estate primary school and only a few travelling to distant cities, usually for medical problems. "Plantation workers are the worst off when compared with other communities," Father Sigamoney observed.