Facebook icon
Twitter icon
e-mail icon

Tamil North-East leads island in taxes from intoxicants

The Sri Lankan government gains the most amount of tax from intoxicants from the Tamil North-East stated Maithripala Sirisena.

The Sri Lankan president said that the areas were the government collects the most tax was from Jaffna, Nuwara Eliya and Batticaloa respectively.

Alongside a rises in alcohol use, there has been an increase of illegal drug usage across the North-East, which civil society activists and politicians say has been contributing to the breakdown of the social fabric of the North-East.

Mr Sirisena added that the government gains Rs. 32 billion from taxes on various intoxicants in rural areas, whilst it spends Rs. 16 billion on their welfare annually.

See our earlier post:

Drug smuggling in North-East aimed at eradicating Tamil society says Chief Minister (07 May 2016) 

We need your support

Sri Lanka is one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a journalist. Tamil journalists are particularly at threat, with at least 41 media workers known to have been killed by the Sri Lankan state or its paramilitaries during and after the armed conflict.

Despite the risks, our team on the ground remain committed to providing detailed and accurate reporting of developments in the Tamil homeland, across the island and around the world, as well as providing expert analysis and insight from the Tamil point of view

We need your support in keeping our journalism going. Support our work today.

For more ways to donate visit https://donate.tamilguardian.com.