DIG Sumith Edirisinghe forgets his past

Thursday, 28 June 2012

DIG Sumith Edirisnghe in-charge of the Nugegoda Division had arbitrarily entered into a land belonging to former parliamentarian Nimal R. Peiris on Hokandara Road, Thalawatugoda and broken down the buildings on the land, Lanka News Web learns. Peirs’ land extends up to one ace and 29 perches.

DIG Sumith Edirisinghe has acted in this arbitrary manner on a directive issued by Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa who is in-charge of the Urban Development Authority (UDA).

Officials from the UDA together with police and army personnel have entered former Colombo District parliamentarian Nimal R. Peiris’ land and demolished the buildings on the land claiming they were unauthorized structures since the land was located on an illegally filled stretch of land.

It is DIG Sumith Edirisinnghe who had ordered the police and army personnel who had arrived at the land to break down the buildings on the land. Peiris had been angered by the actions and had argued with the DIG.

The DIG had shouted at the police personnel saying, “Catch this fellow by his legs and put him in the jeep.”

“Ok, try and do that you ungrateful scoundrel,” Peiris had shouted back and the DIG had slowly moved away.

Former parliamentarian Peiris, relating the story over the telephone to Lanka News Web said that the land had been in his family for the past 75 years and that it was gifted to him by his father. He added that the funeral pyre of his father who passed away about 20 years ago was also made in the respective land.

Peiris further told Lanka News Web that DIG Sumith Edirisinghe had got caught in a land mine explosion on Aturugiriya Road, Hokandara during the JVP terror period in 1988-89and that he had a narrow escape. Afterwards, he had killed 37 young men and women in the Malabe, Aturugiriya and Thalawatugoda areas and buried them in the crate created by the landmine explosion.

When Chandrika Banadaranaike Kumaratunge assumed office in 1994, this mass grave had been dug in 1995 and Edirisinghe at the time had been serving as an ASP. Magistrate Champa Buddhipala serving as the magistrate of Court No. 4 in Colombo had issued open warrants on Edirisinghe and then OIC of the Aturugiriya Police, Anton Siri Kumara.

The former MP said that Edirisinghe had then met him and begged to save him. Edirisinghe had then been provided refuge at Peiris’ residence for a few days.

Edirisinghe had later surrendered to court and had got himself released on bail.

Peiris observed that Edirisinghe had then been found a job as a service station assistant at a station owned by one Anuradha in a state in the US. He had later managed to regain his job at the police through then head of Kumaratunge’s security division, DIG Nihal Karunaratne.

Peiris finally said that DIG Edirisnghe has today forgotten the past.