100,000 litres of nano nitrogen liquid fertiliser, imported for agricultural purposes for the Maha season, reached the Bandaranaike International Airport this morning (20).

Sri Lanka on Tuesday backed down from ambitious plans to become the world’s first completely organic farming nation, reversing a ban on imports of chemical fertiliser.

The JVP says the decision reached by teachers and principals trade unions to report to work on Monday, the 25th of October, when schools reopen under the first phase, was the correct decision.

The teachers and principals, who have been on strike for more than three months, have split into groups that want to resume academic activities on 25 October and others that want to continue their trade union actions until they get a proper solution to the 24-year-old salary issue.

SLPP Chairman and Foreign Minister Prof. G.L. Peiris yesterday (18) emphasised that the worsening financial crisis experienced by the country was so acute the government wasn’t in a position to grant the salary increase sought by school principals and teachers.

The first consignment of 100,000 litres of Nano Nitrogen liquid fertilizer from India will arrive in Sri Lanka today (19).

The Teachers-Principals Trade Union Alliance has informed principals and teachers to report for duty at schools on October 25, and not on October 21 and 22 when the primary sections of schools with less than 200 students reopen.

Parliamentarian Kumara Welgama charges that the current fertiliser crisis created by the government is a form of a mafia to sell cultivated land in the country to foreign countries.

SJB MP Tissa Attanayake yesterday said his party would move a no-confidence motion against Agriculture Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage for his failure to provide fertiliser.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has established a Presidential Task Force for Green Agriculture.

Friday heralded the beginning of the Maha season according to the agrarian calendar; but a majority of the farmers across the country were not in their paddy fields sowing seeds but were on the streets demanding organic fertiliser which the Government has promised to deliver.

The central bank is looking at a proposal to allow persons who can pay in foreign exchange to import vehicles and pay taxes in hard currency, Central Bank Governor Nivard Cabraal said last week.

Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) Chairman Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka yesterday pledged to build up a giant political force to defeat the government and called for people’s support for the same.

Two police constables have been stabbed by a drug addict when they attempted to question him in the area of Modara last night (October 16).

Venerable Athuraliye Rathana Thero, member of ‘Ape Janabala’ Party (Our Power of People Party), has been expelled from the party.

Samagi Jana Balawegaya Parliamentarian Patali Champika Ranawaka says it is regrettable that the government has not been able to provide a stringent solution to teacher principal salary anomalies.