This is a true story related to us by none other than our dear friend Capt. Sri Khantha, an officer attached to 2CLI (Ceylon Light Infantry, 2nd. Battalion).
First, some information about 2CLI.
CLI is an elite regiment of the Ceylon Army Volunteers formed during the colonial times in 1881. During modern times (60’s 70’s), mostly men from professional and commercial backgrounds joined this unit and were from Sri Lanka’s well-known families, landed proprietors, business owners, government bureaucrats, and political families.
After independence, 2CLI was mobilized in a big way during 1971, when the JVP orchestrated rebellion broke out in Southern Sri Lanka. During this JVP insurgency, a group of men and women took up arms and attacked police stations and government buildings, causing extensive losses to life and property.
After recovering from the initial setback, the police went on a rampage, rounding up youth suspected of JVP affiliation, summarily executing them.
The government mobilized 2CLI to rescue the JVP youth from marauding police officers bent on revenge, and bring them for proper processing before a judge.
Eventually, the JVP threat neutralized, and 2CLI demobilized, and officers went back to their civilian careers, which was on hold during active mobilization.
Mostly during the rest of the seventies, officers were mobilized to handle Port Strikes and handle logistics of handling inbound and outbound cargo – which was essential in Sri Lanka’s Export-Import based economy.
This story is surrounding an incident that happened during the mobilization of the CLI officers to provide essential support services during the Colombo Port Strike, which crippled the port operations.
During mobilization, officers from various towns and cities would report for duty and live at the 2CLI HQ. They would bunk for the night and back to work the next day at the port directing soldiers of their unit in operations.
This incident concerns one young officer named Denzel Gunaratna, an executive with an agency house in Colombo. Denzel, from his high school days, has been called Denga – a nickname that stuck to his adulthood and even to the army.
Enter, Tilak Soya, an old codger in his late sixties, a wealthy landowner, retired, and gets out to hang out with the boys whenever the mobilization call goes out.
The daily routine of the mobilized officers at the end of the day of grueling duties at the port was to meet at the officers’ mess and indulge in a fair amount of alcoholic beverage, exchange stories, and shoot the breeze in general.
One such evening of excessive drinking, Denga, woke up in the middle of the night, totally parched and dehydrated. Though it was dark, Denga knew that there would be a glass of water – the valet dutifully places every night on the nightstand separating the beds. Denga scrambled and found the glass and took several gulps of the water until something from inside the glass nearly went into his mouth. Denga grabbed the object inspected it in the dark, ran to the bathroom nearby, and started retching, with two of his fingers deep in his throat. The noise from Denga’s convulsion and spasm woke up all the officers sleeping in an open hall with beds placed side by side. Someone turned the lights on, and all were running to Denga’s help, wondering what caused so much commotion. Meanwhile, Tilak Soysa, who was sleeping on a bed adjoining Denga’s separated by the nightstand, was on all fours on the ground in his sarong, desperately searching for something.
By this time, Denga brought out all the alcohol he consumed the previous evening, the dinner, and his entire stomach contents – exhausted came back to the bed and collapsed.
Meanwhile, Tilak climbed back on to his bed, relieved that he had found his dentures soaked in a glass of water previous night before he went to bed – wondering how it jumped out of the glass and was on the floor.
That is how Denga came to be known as Duth Soup Denga!
