By Jekhan Aruliah
I know people for whom Rs10k is a lot, and others where Rs1million is not a lot. But for rich and poor one thing is the same. We all have 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, and God willing 60 years to contribute our efforts. Contribute to our families, our friends, our careers, our colleagues, and contribute to what we believe in. In a year’s time we will all, great and small, be a year older. This article is about some people who contribute their time to what they believe in, by making people believe in themselves.
I first met Shantha Ruban and Neil AnthonyPillai in the days before Christmas 2023. I was in London to spend the Festive Season with my family. Shantha and Neil came home to talk with me about their new initiative in Jaffna, UNICOM TIC (Training and Innovation Centre). Their vision, to select candidates based on aptitude and attitude regardless of academic success, English language ability, and economic status. To make them in 9 months ‘industry ready’ to join software companies able to become quickly productive staff.
I admit I was sceptical. Shantha and Neil, both Jaffna born and friends since childhood in Colombo now in the Diaspora in Britain, have successful high power careers in the UK. Shantha is Group CEO of tech companies, an accomplished entrepreneur. Neil followed his heart moving from senior tech roles to qualify as a medical doctor in his 30s. Then working with organisations including Medecin Sans Frontieres (MSF) in troubled zones. Now Neil is a doctor with the UK’s National Health Service. They are used to working with focused disciplined people in focused disciplined environments. People who know what they must do to get where they want to go. In Jaffna, a very different environment, they proposed to pick up people who had hardly experienced success, people who had hardly tasted or even seen the rewards of hard work. I predicted within months a high dropout rate would leave their classes half empty.
How wrong I was, and how very happy I am to be wrong. More than 4 months into the 9 month programme out of 120 only 5 have dropped out. One pressured by family to accept a public sector job offer!
UNICOM TIC was searching for the ‘diamonds in the rough’, hidden unpolished talents. I myself was taught from school age how to write my CV, I was coached to present myself as a smart interesting person at interviews. Excellent schools, university and opportunities were within my reach. My peer group, the people around me, worked hard and saw the rewards of success. I had the evidence in front and around and within me that it was worth putting in the honest effort.
TIC searched for those without these advantages. They now focus on the underserved Northern and Eastern regions, with a vision to expand across other provinces. TIC helped people who had never filled an application form in their lives. People held back by poverty, by caste, by lack of opportunity, by low aspiration and expectation of everyone around them. TIC pushed open a door for them that would otherwise be locked, that would change their lives. And change their children’s lives, who would be born into professional families enjoying the advantages their parents hadn’t had.
Workshops were held in towns from Jaffna, Killinochchi and Vavuniya down to Batticaloa and Nuwara Eliya. Workshops were held to tell the people what TIC was about, and to help these people fill their application forms properly. 3,000 applications were made, which by stages and processes were whittled down to 120 who joined the programme. TIC saw through their life’s smoke and debris to see the potential and the desire in the 120 to become great software professionals. To be assets to employers, with a few in years to come founding companies to become employers themselves.
Applications came from those with only O’Levels upto university graduates. The chosen were mostly 18-23 years old, with a few over 35 years. The majority are from families below the poverty line, these each receive monthly stipends from the Blossom Trust UK, a registered charity in the UK.
TIC launched in March 2024. The once powerful Northern Cooperatives have properties all around the province. I have visited offices, warehouses, factories languishing operating under capacity and idle. Over the years, not least due to the war, the cooperatives’ power faded leaving many of these properties under used. TIC rented a prime property from a cooperative, 4,000 unused square feet on a single floor, within 2 minutes walk of Jaffna Fort. Fitting it out with new furniture, partitions, and new computers. Recruiting well qualified staff from administrators to teachers. And put in their ‘secret sauce’: either Shantha or Neil is present in Jaffna all the time. The students understand if these two top people believe it is worth investing their time and effort, then it is worth the student investing their own time and effort too.
The former war zones of the North and East have received a lot of investment that is wasted. Millions of dollars come in on a “fund and forget” basis. Coming from international NGOs, charities, and individual diaspora donors with little impact. How do I know only little impact? Because 15 years after the end of the war the North is still poor in money and poor in opportunity. I am sure for Shantha and Neil TIC appears even in their sleep, no forgetting here.
TIC has already raised funding for the first two years 2024 & 2025, covering capital and running costs.
Offering 100% scholarships, there is no financial barrier to entry.
Shantha has the humility to know what he doesn’t know. TIC is learning how to raise the students to professional level in 9 months. Not only a technical challenge, but communications and confidence are major issues. Coming from the backgrounds many of them do, they are stepping from toiling on farms, building sites and in shops to working with the top tier of professionals internationally.
Part of TIC’s challenge is to place the students with good employers. Software and technology companies in the North and elsewhere are needed to take the graduates on the next stage of their journeys when they complete the TIC programme at the end of the year.
I asked TIC what tech they covered: full-stack development, specifically JavaScript, C#, .NET Core, Angular, Azure. Business analysis, database technology, deployment, version control, and best practices. Ensuring a person has all required skill sets to become an industry-ready full-stack software developer.
The recruiting companies will provide a great service to these young people, and the recruits trained by TIC will provide great services to the companies. Both recruiter and recruit, by their very example and success, provide great service to the community proving that those with a will can escape the “dead end”.
It takes an organisation like UNICOM TIC to open the door, but it takes energetic trainees to walk through that door, and willing employers to welcome the TIC graduates when they pass out.
Funding is in place for the first two years, 2024 and 2025. After that, with the TIC model tested and proved, sponsors will be needed to continue this great project. And extend it beyond Jaffna and the North.
Employers can visit UNICOM TIC by arrangement, to see what is going on here. Sponsors too please make contact.
You can contact UNICOM TIC on +94 77 922 9555 (telephone and WhatsApp)
( — The writer Jekhan Aruliah was born in Sri Lanka and moved with his family to the UK when he was two years of age. Brought up in London, he graduated from Cambridge University in 1986 with a degree in Natural Sciences. Jekhan then spent over two decades in the IT industry, for half of which he was managing offshore software development for British companies in Colombo and in Gurgaon (India). In 2015 Jekhan decided to move to Jaffna where he is now involved in social and economic projects. He can be contacted at jekhanaruliah@gmail.com — )