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This Blue bigwig from the South was among those elevated to Ministerial level with the formation of the national government.

   Soon after being sworn in, he left Colombo for the South to attend a religious ceremony held in a Buddhist temple there. Incidentally the Chief Guest at the event was the deposed Big Boss. On his way to the temple ceremony, a crowd had jeered at him. And it was a highly perturbed Ministerial one who later sat next to his former boss when the ceremony got underway. They were making small talk, but the Ministerial one could not shake off an uneasy feeling bothering him ever since the unexpected unnerving incident. His former Boss who detected the gloom in his mood, remarked: “You look upset over something. Aren’t you happy that you have got a Ministerial office?”

“Sir, the portfolio I got is useless – it’s nothing compared to the one I held earlier. My present job is confined to overseeing the payment of salaries to the House staff,” the Ministerial one said. He added as an afterthought: “I am mulling my next move.”

The ceremony over, both the new Ministerial one and his former boss called at the residence of the Nilame of Devinuwara Devalaya as the latter’s dinner guests. The gloomy feeling had weighed heavily on the Ministerial one even at the time they parted ways following the dinner, our sources say.