A Bar on the Road to the Shrine: Beruwala’s Unasked Question
Beruwala is not merely a seaside town. It is a metaphor. A place where commerce and faith have coexisted for centuries, sometimes uneasily, sometimes profitably, and often under the watchful eye of politics. It is home to some of Sri Lanka’s oldest Muslim communities, venerable mosques, and sacred shrines that predate the modern state itself. It is also a place where memory lingers longer than official records would like.
One such memory, stubborn and unresolved, concerns a modest alcohol outlet once known locally as Number Three Bar, situated on Galle Road, Beruwala. The location matters. Galle Road is not just another thoroughfare; it is a junction that leads directly towards the Buhari Thakkiya, one of the holiest Islamic shrines in the region, frequented daily by worshippers and pilgrims.
The question is not whether Sri Lanka permits alcohol sales. It does. The question is why a bar was licensed at precisely that location—and under whose political authority.
Power, Legacy, and Selective Forgetting
The licence in question was granted during the period when Bakeer Makkar, later Speaker of Parliament, failed lawyer, not had any success in the legal profession . served as the Member of Parliament for Beruwala. At the time, Bakeer Makkar styled himself as a leading political voice of Sri Lankan Muslims, a bridge between faith and state, tradition and modern governance. His authority over the electorate was considerable, his influence unquestioned.
Today, the name Bakeer Makkar has returned to public prominence, though in a different register.
Imtiaz Bakeer Makkar, his son, is widely presented as a figure of religious seriousness: a trustee of Masjidul Al Abrar, one of the oldest mosques in Beruwala, and a visible participant in Islamic events across the country. He is often introduced as a principled Muslim leader, a supporter of the Palestinian cause, and a man whose family has produced diplomats, international civil servants, and senior figures with access to global institutions.
It is a narrative of prestige, piety, and public service—carefully maintained and rarely questioned.
Yet politics, like faith, is ultimately tested not by rhetoric but by consistency.
The Geography of Morality
In Islamic ethical tradition, space matters. What is permitted near a mosque or a shrine is not simply a regulatory question but a moral one. Proximity carries symbolism. A bar placed on the road leading to a sacred site is not morally neutral, even if it is legally licensed.
This is why the Galle Road licence continues to trouble Beruwala’s collective conscience.
No serious attempt has ever been made to explain why the licence was granted, whether objections were raised, or how local religious sensitivities were weighed. Nor has there been a public reckoning with the political responsibility of the MP under whose watch it occurred.
What has existed instead is silence.
When Silence Becomes Power
Journalists familiar with Sri Lanka’s media ecology speak quietly—almost ritualistically—about stories that cannot be written. Editors mention legal caution. Social media posts disappear. Criticism of the Bakeer Makkar family, particularly when it touches on this episode, rarely survives long in mainstream discourse.
Whether this is the result of formal pressure, informal influence, or simple fear of litigation is difficult to prove. What is easier to observe is the outcome: a story widely known locally but absent nationally.
In any democracy, silence of this kind should provoke concern—particularly when it surrounds individuals who claim moral authority.
The Question of Moral Leadership
Supporters of Imtiaz Bakeer argue that a son should not be judged by the political decisions of his father. They are correct, as far as the law is concerned. Guilt is not inherited. Responsibility is not genetic.
But moral leadership operates by a different standard.
When an individual positions himself as a trustee of a major mosque, as a custodian of community ethics, and as a public moral voice—especially on issues of justice and oppression—he invites scrutiny not only of his personal conduct, but of the values he chooses to foreground and those he chooses to obscure.
The issue is not punishment. It is accountability.
A Mosque Committee’s Quiet Dilemma
Within Beruwala, an awkward question has begun to surface: should mosque management committees—particularly those associated with Masjidul Abrar and the Maradana Mosque—seek clarification, or even temporary withdrawal, until these matters are openly addressed?
This is not an act of hostility. It is an act of institutional self-preservation.
Mosques are not private clubs. They are moral institutions. Trusteeship (amanah) carries with it an obligation to transparency, humility, and ethical coherence. When unresolved political legacies cast long shadows, pretending those shadows do not exist weakens the institution itself.
Hypocrisy or Unfinished Business?
Critics describe the situation as hypocritical: public religiosity alongside unacknowledged political compromise; moral speeches paired with selective memory.
It is a harsh judgment—but one rooted in contradiction rather than malice.
The most corrosive aspect of this episode is not the bar licence alone, but the refusal to engage with it openly. Faith traditions survive not because their leaders are flawless, but because they are capable of honest reckoning.
The Question That Lingers
There is a question now circulating quietly in Beruwala, asked without microphones or press conferences:
“When you speak for Muslim values, what do you say about Galle Road?”
It is not a question designed to humiliate. It is one designed to clarify.
Truth as an Act of Faith
Questioning political history is not an attack on Islam. Demanding transparency from religious trustees is not anti-Muslim. On the contrary, Islamic moral philosophy places extraordinary emphasis on justice, truth, and accountability—particularly for those in positions of authority.
Beruwala deserves more than curated narratives and selective silence. It deserves an open conversation.
Until that conversation takes place, Number Three Bar on Galle Road will remain not just a building, but a symbol—of unresolved power, moral inheritance, and a question that refuses to go away.
And in Beruwala, a town that remembers everything, silence will never be mistaken for innocence.