The government has decided to use the name ‘Udarata’ (Malaigam) instead of the name ‘Wathu’, which has been used for two centuries to identify the plantation people, says Deputy Minister of Plantations and Community Infrastructure Sundaralingam Pradeep.
The Deputy Minister made this statement while participating in the 2025 Sabaragamuwa Provincial Thai Pongal festival held at the Karapincha St. Joachim Tamil Maha Vidyalaya in Ratnapura.
The Tamil-speaking people who came from India about two hundred years ago to cultivate tea in the hilly areas of Sri Lanka are known as the plantation people.
Even today, they live with an identity separate from the Tamil people of the North and East.
For many years, they have been requesting governments through NGOs not to recognize them as plantation people and to recognize them as Kandyan Tamils or Malaygams. They also do not agree to be recognized as Sri Lankan Tamils.
Since there is recognition among the Sinhalese as Kandyan Sinhalese, they are also demanding that they be recognized as Kandyan Tamils.