Sri Lanka continues to witness political crisis hours after President Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled to Maldives on a day he is supposed to resign and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe took over as acting president declaring a state of emergency.
However, protests intensified even after the imposition of emergency with the demonstrators defiant amid tear gas shells fired by the security forces. The protesters even stormed the Prime Minister’s residence, demanding his resignation.
The unit of India’s biggest oil firm, Lanka IOC, has asked all its 216 petrol pumps in Sri Lanka to maintain a separate fuel stockpile for supply to ambulances in the crisis-hit island nation. The company, which is a subsidiary of state-owned Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), is operating all its petrol pumps normally and is provisioning to meet the increased rush.
Lanka IOC Managing Director Manoj Gupta told this to a news agency. Sri Lanka’s Defence Chief, General Shavendra Silva said, the armed forces and police would respect the constitution, and asked protesters to maintain calm.
Meanwhile, Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa who fled the country and took refuge in the Maldives faced protests, with dozens of compatriots urging Male not to provide him safe haven. According to news agencies, Sri Lankan President Rajapaksa who left for the Maldives early this morning is to leave for Singapore later.
The crisis in Sri Lanka is said to have begun due to multiple compounding factors like external debt, a nationwide policy to shift to organic or biological farming, tax cuts, Easter bombings in 2019, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. India has been helping Sri Lanka through humanitarian assistance worth over 3.5 billion dollars by providing food, medicines and fuel through several lines of credit.
