B.D.K.Saldin B.A.(Econ) is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka. He was the Director/Secretary of Forbes and Walker Ltd., until his retirement in 1988. He has been keenly interested in the Sri Lankan Malay language as a vehicle for preserving the identity of his community in Sri Lanka. He is a regular contributor to the "Terang", a quarterly journal issued by the Kandy Malay Association. He successfully concluded a pilot project in teaching adults to read and write Malay under the auspices of the Sri Lanka Malay Association. He has presented papers on the Language of Sri Lanka Malays at the Hari Sastera 93 Conference, at Selangor, Malaysia in June 1993, at the Symposium of Malay Polynesian Elements in the Commonwealth in Kuala Lumpur in November 1998 and at the Conference of Literateurs of the Malay world in Johore Baru in April 1999. He is also the author of the book The Sri Lanka Malays and their language.