A meeting took place between Indian High Commissioner – Mr. Gopal Baglay and President Ranil Wickremesinghe at the Presidential Secretariat today (04).
The discussions focused on raising national milk production and providing necessary technical support to the production of liquid milk in Sri Lanka together with the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) of India and Amul Milk Company.
The objective is to make Sri Lanka self-sufficient in milk and dairy products in the long term with short and medium term goals to double local milk production.
The President appointed a committee consisting of representatives of the public and private sectors to work with the multidisciplinary team of the National Dairy Development Board of India to prepare a short, medium and long-term plan for the development of the dairy sector in the country. This endeavour is aimed at preventing the decline in milk production and dependence on imported milk in Sri Lanka. The discussion was held between the members of the committee and representatives of the National Dairy Board of India (NDDB).
The discussion was attended by Indian High Commissioner – Mr. Gopal Baglay, Dr. Rakesh Pandey, First Secretary, Economic and Commercial Affairs, representatives of the National Dairy Development Board of India and Amul Milk Company, Mr. Sagala Ratnayake, Senior Advisor to the President on National Security and Chief of Presidential Staff, Mr. Saman Ekanayake, President’s Secretary and a group of public and private sector representatives appointed by the President.
The government has decided to abolish the project launched under former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to upgrade 671 provincial schools as national schools.
Under the project, each school was allocated Rs.02 million – totaling over Rs.1340 million – for emergency renovations and new national school name boards, with some costing over Rs.500,000.
Schools have now been instructed to remove these boards, along with the “National School” title, official seals, and letterheads, and revert to their previous identities.
The initiative aimed to increase the number of national schools to 329,000, but only 05 schools in the Western Province were converted.
Professor Kapila Perera, Secretary of the Ministry of Education at that time, now serves as Secretary to the Ministry of Transport and Highways.
The Government of Sri Lanka has officially declared the list of Public and Bank Holidays for the year 2026, through an Extraordinary Gazette issued on Tuesday, May 27, 2025.
The Union of Postal and Telecommunications Officers says postal services will operate as usual today (May 31).
Secretary Manjula Jayasundara stated that striking union members returned to work from yesterday (May 30) afternoon, and distribution of over 2,000 delayed mail bags has begun.
This strike, launched over 10 demands including delays in recruitment, has reportedly drawn the attention of the relevant authorities.