Supporters of Sri Lankas main opposition burn placards during a protest outside the president's office in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Highlights
- Sri Lankan economy facing worst crisis in over 70 years
- The island nation is witnessing scarcity of fuel amid skyrocketing prices
- Experts say reckless borrowings from China prime reason behind the crisis
Sri Lanka economic crisis: As Sri Lanka grapples with its worst economic crisis in decades, India may be staring towards yet another refugee influx from the island nation.
Over 90,000 Lankan refugees, who had crossed into the Indian territory over during years of civil war in the late 1980s to mid-1990s, are still living in several camps across Tamil Nadu, reports said. According to Home Ministry data, over 3 lakh Lankan refugees had come to India, however, almost a lakh of them have been officially repatriated to Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka is currently undergoing an unprecedented economic crisis which is likely to trigger another round refugee flow to India. 16 Sri Lankan nationals arrived at Tamil Nadu's shores on Tuesday morning.
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The Lankans said that they had paid an amount of Rs 50,000 to a boatman who had dropped them early Tuesday at a sand dune near Rameswaram and were later rescued by the Indian Coast Guard. Ten other people also reached Tamil Nadu late in the evening, reports said.
What is happening in Sri Lanka and why China is to be blamed
The south Asian nation is finding it hard to tackle one of its worst economic crisis. Prices of essential commodities, including milk and rice have skyrocketed, petrol and diesel are not available and power stations have been shut. Schools are not holding examinations due to lack of paper for printing question papers, reports said.
According to AFP, the government on Tuesday ordered troops at petrol pumps to control the crowd and protests that erupted due to scarce availability of fuel.
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President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has called a meeting of all parties, however, the Opposition parties said they will boycott the meeting. Last week, President Rajapaksa had sought help from International Monetary Fund amid the deepening crisis.
In his televised address, the president asked the nation not to be discouraged and have faith in his steps to salvage the situation.
Sri Lanka's usable foreign reserves are said to be less that $400 million, according to experts, and it has nearly $7 billion in foreign debt obligations for this year.
Though the crisis in Sri Lanka was apparent after the pandemic that dried up the international tourist traffic to the island nation, one of its main foreign exchange-earners, the country's debts spiralled and foreign exchange reserves shrunk as the end result of reckless borrowings from China to finance infrastructure projects, reported The Hong Kong Post.
With tourism hit by the pandemic, the economic structure of Sri Lanka, which was already tottering under the heavy burden of loans, crumbled. A major part of this debt was owed to China, which accounts for nearly USD 8 billion.
This debt burden was a result of China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects like Hambantota Port and Colombo Port City for which Chinese agencies lent large amounts to Sri Lanka under stiff terms of repayment, reported ANI.
(With inputs from agencies)
