Kirinde, original ancesters were from Punjab

Kirinde, Vir Prathap Vikram-Sinha
May I first start this essay by offring my greatest integrity and gratitude to my late Grand father Punchi Banda Wikramsinha, My late Grand Uncles Vijay Banda Wikramasinha and Harischandra Banda Wikramasinha. When the truth about my ancestry was reviled to me by them some where around 1980-81 I was quite young and credulous. Also during this period of revelation there were no computers to steadfastly decimate the information. Besides this, my parents’ generation did their best to conceal the truth fearing repudiation in Srilanka. Srilanka was known as Ceylon until the year 1972. For me my original roots are greater than anything in this world. I am proud of my Punjabi ancestral roots.


The village of Kirinde is situated within a group of villages known as Ganghatha in the hill country. These serene and radiant villages of Ganghatha are situated roughly 12 miles south of the capital hill town of Kandy in Ceylon (Srilanka). The interesting thing is this village of Kirinde is out side of these seven villages but lies within them. In today’s Srilanka’s sinhala language translate Ganghatha to mean seven villages. My ancestor named the area as “Gangsath” which, in that dialect, in his area of Punjab, literally meant seven rivers. These rivers were miniature versions, reminiscent to the giant rivers of Punjab. Translating it as seven villages is total balderdash. Truly speaking these seven villages never existed prior to my ancestor Vir Prathap Vikram-sinha’s arrival there and named the area as Gangsath. The original area was a spread out area of delightfully dense forest with embellishing streams and water falls inhabited by people belonging to a lower cast, known as “Rodi”. Agriculture was minimal. A few paddy fields existed that were cultivated by “Govigama” the upper cast who were outsiders. They came to cultivate the fields from the village from the other side of the mountain. I decided to write about our ancestry because I really feel a personal attachment and connection with my ancestor Vir Prathap Vikram-sinha.

My ancestor Vir Prathap Vikram-Sinha was the 4th child of the 4th wife of a minor Raja (Duke) who ruled a small region in the Punjab which is today a part of the north Indian state of Haryana. It is area is known as Jeendh. As the 4th child of the 4th wife of the Vikram-Sinha dynasty he was not destined to inherit anything valuable which could generate political power or wealth. His duties were limited to military activity. He was known as a superb strategist and tactician in military sense but I unable to give a full conclusion about his political and economic capabilities. He was known as a humble man. Since he knew he would never inherit the position of a ruler his frustration grew and like any human being he displayed this frustration in public. He was seen as a threat to the system and was forced by the family to leave the region for his own safety.

So Vir Prathap Viram-Sinha travelled south wards and for a while settled in Mahrastra and got married to a noble lady from Nagpur area. She was also from an aristocratic family. They had one son and one daughter. For Vir Prathap, the loss of prestige and respect kept hurting him. So the decision was taken to move towards the sea coast of Maharastra. Then from there he must have got the idea of leaving the land for a far away place to get out of the frustration and dispointment he incurred. So he boarded a boat with an entourage of Punjabis and Mharastrians and set sail south wards. Vir Prathap’s original idea wouldn’t have been to migrate to Ceylon (Srilanka). I believe it was inherently an accident. But I am unable to comment as to what his original planes were, and where my ancestor Vir Prathap really wanted to settle down. Any way the boat sailed south and most probably due to heavy seas would have accidentally or intentionally hit the shores of Kirinda, a tiny village in the south eastern coast of Ceylon (Srilanka).

Kirinda is a very beautiful coastal area rich in history. Greatest being that legendry princess Vihara Maha Devi blessed and directed by Ganaga devi, the sister of Parvathi and sister in law of Lord Shiva, landed here in the tranquil area of Kirinda with its river Kirindi oya flowing beautifully into the southern sea. Kiri-inda, the two words. Kiri means or represents whiteness, pureness or unspoiltness. So milk is Kiri. Inda or Indha means fountain or beginning. Kirinda in Sanskrit means fountain of purity. Its Ganga devi, parvathi’s sister and lord Shiva’s sister in law who is the fountain of purity. Hinduism considers her to be the mother of all Humanity. Not far from there is the blessed spiritual town of Khatharagam which was the military base of Lord Shiva’s son Khartikeya or other wise supposed to be known to the present day locals as Khathira I was told. The place was named as Khathiragam in honour of this great son of Lord Shiva Karthikeya. Kharthikeya, is well known in the northern parts of India as Skandakumar, fought a massive celestial battle to get rid of an evil invasion by Asuras from another planet. According to the Shiva purana, written most probably between six and eight millenniums ago, Khathiragam, the place where this spiritual town is situated today is the place where Kharthikeya’s forward strike tactical space fighter unit was supposed to have been based. The rear strike tactical space fighter unit was based on the other side of the Himalaya range. The side strike tactical space fighter units were supposed to have been based in what is today known as Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan on one side and the other in what is today known as Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam region. It is said Skandhakumar got a superb view of the universe from Khathiragam. He planed and executed his counter attacks to stop the invading evil Asura space ships from here and prevented the Asuras from striking the main land of Bharata (India). But the Asuras, though unsuccessful, delivered a massive and devastating onslaught from space with their high burning laser cannons and destroyed major parts of land. That is why some experts of today have come in to conclusion; the depth of Eastern and Northan parts of the Indian coast were created by extra terrestrial activity.


Coming back to the arrival of Vir Prathap in Ceylon (Srilanka), in the later parts of the 16th century he apparently settled in Kirinda only for a brief period of time. The geography of the area was not what Vir Prathap was used to. Hearing the existence of a mountain range he took the decision to explore. Not all who came from his Indian entourage would have joined the exploration. Some Punjabis, Maharastrians and natives of Kirinda would have constituted the exploring group. Having passed so many mountains the group came across this beautiful area, which was reminiscent to Punjab. The abundance of water and vegetation made him to name the area Gangsath, seven rivers, which eventually became known as Ganghatha. The name Kirinde was the name given by the natives to the people who arrived from Kirinda. The natives did not know to distinguish the difference between Pujabis, Maharastrians and the Kirindas. So they named them as Kirinde. In sinhala language when a noun ends in ‘a’ it literally means the place, region or location. When the noun ends in ‘e’ it indicates to ‘that or those of from a place, region or location’. So the natives called Kirinde for the people who came from Kirinda.
Between the late 16th century and the beginning of the 17th century Vir Prathap started his settlements. The ‘Rodi’ cast was pushed further away from the settlements. There wasn’t a way for the ‘Rodi’ cast to merge with the new comers whose ideas and social values were far greater than theirs, because they either didn’t posses the necessary intelligence and skills to work on agriculture and understand new social values or they weren’t simply interested in changing their centuries old habits. Vir Prathap expanded rice fields greatly and encouraged to grow more vegetables. He also encouraged dairy farming. Reared and maintained a large herd of elephants. He made use of the abundantly available water resources to a great extent. Later when the King got to hear about the talents of Vir Prathap, he was invited to the palace and given an important position in the King’s cabinet. Vir Prathap Vikram-sinha was put in charge of the military. He fought and won with a lot of invaders including the Europeans.


Vir Prathap went on to have two more sons from his legitimate marriage who in a later period returned to Southern part of India. After they left the village very little was known about them. The elder son got married to a prominent aristocratic family who apparently had connections to south Indian aristocracy but no records of names were available. The daughter’s marriage records show that she married to a prominent family by the name ‘Panabokkha’ who was apparently a cousin of the King. There are no records of names. Recoding of names came to be published in a later period. But if any one is interested in doing further investigation there may be scripts available in “oala” form at Galgediyava, grand uncle Harischandra bandra’s residential area. That whole village is related to one another, so somebody might contain useful information. All cannot be lost.

The name Vikram-Sinha became acquainted with the local pronunciation and became Viramasinha. In later periods with the influence of the British the spelling changed to Wikramasinha. It was this name, Wikramasinha that was used as the family name up to my grand father’s generation. The Name Kirinde as a family name starts with my father’s generation. Before them it was all Wikramasinhas. S.M.W. Kirinde (Stanly), S.T.W. Kirinde (Sidny), A.B.W. Kirinde (Artie), H.B.W. Kirinde (Harry), Sunil Kirinde, Ranjan Kirinde and various other Kirindes, they are all my fathers generation. Prior to them the surmame Kirinde didn’t exist. Kirinde was just a name that identified a place within, but outside the so called seven villages of Ganghatha, which my honourable ancestor Vir Prathap Vikram-Sinha named Gangsath.

Well one might wonder as to why I have taken this entire trouble to expose something that was told to me by some of my elders three decades ago. It is because as I got matured and older I found it interesting as to how names evolve and how people get identified by those names. When this process takes place people automatically tend loose their true identity and the ancestry moves into oblivion. I find this amazing. I am yet unable to believe how my father’s generation concealed the truth in order to gain insignificant material benefits such as preserving a government job. I seek my apologies if I have been too blunt in expressing my self. But at some point the truth has to be told and what I learned from the great Upanishads of the Vedas and particularly from the Bagavad Gita, is that, the truth is irrepressible.