The sudden death of veteran Sri Lankan leftist politician Nandana Gunathilake has taken on added political and emotional weight after his family halted a planned cremation, opting instead for burial to preserve the body for possible future investigations. The decision follows mounting questions over the circumstances of his death and revelations that Gunathilake had previously reported threats to his life to an international monitoring organization.
Gunathilake, a former leader of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna and later a member of the United National Party, passed away on Sunday morning. His death triggered an outpouring of tributes from across Sri Lanka’s political spectrum, alongside sharp criticism from sections of his former political comrades, particularly within the JVP-led National People’s Power. While many remembered him as a disciplined organizer and a key figure in rebuilding the JVP after its near destruction in the late 1980s, some current leaders openly questioned his legacy.
In a move that sparked widespread condemnation, Minister K. D. Lal Kantha wrote on social media that Gunathilake was “zero” to him, arguing that the former leader’s contributions to building the JVP were cancelled out by what he described as damage to the party. The remark drew criticism for its tone and timing, with commentators saying it was needlessly harsh given Gunathilake’s death and long political history.
Amid this backdrop, Gunathilake’s sister, Mangala Karunathilaka, announced at a media briefing at the Wadduwa Buddhist Youth Association Hall that the family had cancelled the cremation scheduled at the Wadduwa Public Stadium. Instead, she said the body would be buried at the Mahawadduwa Weragama Public Cemetery to ensure it could be preserved if further investigations were required.
She explained that the decision was taken after a video statement was released by the Global Center for Monitoring Political and Economic Crimes in Sri Lanka. According to the organization’s executive director, Gunathilake had approached the group in October last year, stating that he and three other political activists were facing political pressure and death threats. He had reportedly sought protection and formally authorized the organization to act on his behalf. Mangala Karunathilaka said she had been unaware of these developments until the video was made public, and that several political actors subsequently urged her not to cremate the body.
Gunathilake was widely regarded as a central figure of the so-called “Generation of the 1980s,” a period marked by intense political violence in both the North and South of Sri Lanka. The decade saw the JVP’s second insurrection and one of the bloodiest counter-insurgency campaigns in the country’s history. Former minister Patali Champika Ranawaka described Gunathilake as standing “at the very centre of a cycle of killing and counter-killing,” noting that when many senior JVP leaders were killed or fled abroad after 1989, Gunathilake remained in Sri Lanka and played a pivotal role in rebuilding the party from near extinction. That rebuilt structure later enabled Somawansa Amarasinghe to assume leadership.
Gunathilake’s prominence peaked in 1999 when he contested the presidential election as the common candidate of the Left, symbolizing the JVP’s return to electoral politics. In 2004, he became chairman of the United People’s Freedom Alliance, formed by the JVP and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party under President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga. However, deepening internal divisions eventually led to his break with the JVP. He later aligned with Sinhala nationalist figures and supported the government’s military campaign against the LTTE, before opposing the Rajapaksa administration in its later years and backing the 2015 political change.
In his final years, Gunathilake lived largely on the margins of mainstream politics and faced personal hardship, a fate his supporters say he shared with other former JVP leaders who fell out with the party. Ranawaka argued that the treatment of figures like Gunathilake should serve as a warning to current NPP activists about the cost of internal dissent.
