Incomplete Citizenship of the Plantation Community: Access to Governance Institutions and Public Service Delivery Furthermore, they do have a strong feeling and preconceived notion that formal institutions are ineffective, inaccessible and disempowering. Similarly, this tendency is also caused by lack of competency in Sinhala language, especially among an older generation, where public institutions outside of the North and East are incapable of serving Tamil-speaking service seekers. This leaves the Plantation Community feeling powerless, unheard, and silenced. In addition, this community is not treated with special care or from the perspective of a marginalised community. There is no affirmative action or policy of positive discrimination to ensure speedy recovery from historical discrimination. They have to go through the same bureaucratic bottlenecks, incomprehensible rules, regulations, the need for documents to which they do not have access, and difficulties in accessing relevant information. At the local level, there are plenty of public and local government institutions to serve the deserving communities in line with stipulated rules and regulations. Yet, in practice, such institutions do work in favour of local elites. They have direct access to and influence over local level officials and resist equal distribution of resources and government patronage to needy people. In such contexts, people of the plantations feel humiliated and excluded. This pattern is more likely to have an influence in public service delivery and institutional working, which could increase the likelihood of limiting access to public services and social rights, though it has been slowly changing among the younger generation. Nevertheless, it does not mean that legal citizenship did not make any progress in this community. There has been some impact on the socio-economic and political spheres, though it is modest when compared to other communities. 33