Page 18 - Memoirs of Sarasworthy Somasundaram

Samuel

An unexpected bonus
At the time Samuel obtained his postgraduate degree, Statistics was a comparatively new
field and he was offered to be the Ceylon Government’s representative at Conferences
related to Statistics, planning etc.

At one of the ECAFE Conferences held in Bangkok, at which Samuel and his team had
participated. The ECAFE had been impressed and at the end of the conference he had been
offered a place on the ECAFE staff. Samuel felt he had no right to accept as he had attended
the conference as a Government representative.

But the U Nyun had followed up his offer with an official letter to the Ceylon Government
requesting Mr Somasundaram’s services for the ECAFE. The Government department had
diplomatically filed the letter by “Letters waiting replies locker”

Samuel of course was not informed of this. At the time he and his officers were fully
involved in conducting the Census – (held every 10 years)

Some months later, U Nyun had come to Ceylon on an Official visit. He had met Samuel and
had asked him why there had been no response to their letter. Samuel was of course taken
by surprise. “I didn’t know you had written” he had said. U Nyan took it up with the
Authorities. They said “the letter is in his file, we can’t possibly release him just yet. We
need him to complete the Census. We will consider your request after the Census program
has been completed”

It wouldn’t have been diplomatic to say no to a U.N. request!

Samuel was of course happy and we left Bangkok in September 1963

Amara was born the night of the Census. When the Census requests were received in the
Colombo office, Samuel had checked the Jaffna reports to see if the Chavakecchi Hospital
babies had been included in the lists. Finding the Hospital list, he found it missing and
added 1 to the Chavakechchi list, he had to give his niece priority place in the Census he was
conducting!! That’s how Amara was the +1 in the 1963 Sri Lanka Census Report.

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