Making representations on behalf of CWC at the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission yesterday (13), Deputy Minister of Economic Development Muthu Sivalingam stressed the need of strengthening the administrative, legislative and institutional measures to ensure that the average citizen can transact business with State Institutions in his or her mother tongue.

The Deputy Minister added that 52 percent of people in the Nuwara Eliya district are Tamil but state institutions do not deal with them in their own language. People in the district who had been deprived of better educational opportunities in the past find it difficult to deal with State institutions in other languages, he added.

He stated that the CWC along with some plantation unions submitted proposals on August 12 for the establishment of new Divisional Secretariat Divisions and GN divisional and revision of existing divisions to the Delimination Committee appointed by the Public Administration and Home Affairs Minister.

He was of the view that the people of Indian origin can get better service from the public institutions, if those proposals were accepted by the Committee.

The Deputy Minister said the President should monitor the activities of the Government institutions. He said Tamil speaking officers should also be posted to the Government institutions in areas where Tamils live predominantly.