In 2024, the National People’s Power made Sri Lankans a clear promise. Its manifesto pledged the “abolition of all oppressive acts including the PTA”. Voters believed it and gave the NPP a historic mandate.
Two years on, that promise has reached Parliament. The Protection of the State from Terrorism Bill was gazetted on 22 September 2026 and presented on 6 October. On paper, it delivers: one clause repeals the PTA. The Minister of Justice says the new law will target terrorism alone. The President, who has admitted the old definition of terrorism was so broad it invited abuse, has promised precise definitions and strong safeguards. Sri Lanka has also undertaken to the UN and the European Union, including as a condition of GSP+ trade concessions, to replace the PTA with a law that meets international standards.
These are welcome words. But Parliament does not vote on press conferences. It votes on the text of a Bill, and the text tells a different story. It keeps the PTA’s core: detention ordered by the executive, arrest without a warrant, and offences broad enough to catch ordinary politics. This is not the end of an old cage. It is the same cage with a new name.
What the Bill actually says
Amnesty International, UN human rights experts and the Centre for Policy Alternatives have each examined the Bill. Their concerns converge on four points.
- A definition that reaches into politics. Terrorism includes acts meant to “unduly compel” a government. That phrase could capture strikes, mass protests, or ordinary political pressure.
- Arrest without a warrant. Security forces may arrest on “reasonable suspicion” alone.
- Detention by the executive. The Defence Secretary may order a person held for up to a year, and a magistrate cannot overturn that order. A person may be held without charge for up to two years.
- Bans with little oversight. The President may proscribe organisations, and officials may declare “prohibited places”, with little scrutiny by the courts.
The Bill does exclude protest, advocacy, dissent, labour action, and humanitarian work. It lets magistrates visit places of detention. These are real improvements, but they miss the central defect. The executive still decides who is locked up and for how long, and no court can effectively say no. A visit is not control.
Sri Lanka has already seen where such powers lead.
A temporary law that never left
In July 1979, facing rising violence in the North, the Jayewardene government brought in the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act. It was meant to last three years. Certified “urgent”, it gave the Supreme Court only hours for review and passed Parliament in a single day.
Its powers were extraordinary. A Minister could order detention for 18 months. Confessions made to police became evidence. Failing to report a “terrorist” became a crime, yet the Act never defined who a terrorist was. In 1982 it was made permanent, again as an urgent Bill. It has now been in force for 47 years.
Its reach grew fast. Its first detainees were reportedly not northern militants but two Sinhalese opposition activists. In July 1983, Tamil PTA prisoners were killed inside Welikada Prison, in State custody. Days later, the government blamed the JVP, the Communist Party and the Nava Sama Samaja Party for the pogrom, an accusation since shown to be false. It banned them and detained their leaders. The pattern was set early: sweeping powers, little judicial scrutiny, and a stated purpose soon left behind.
Forty-seven years of victims
No government has ever published how many people the PTA has detained, or how many were freed without charge. That silence is part of the problem.
The figures that do exist are grim. By 1990, some 6,700 suspected JVP members were held under emergency and anti-terrorism powers. In 2018, the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka found that over half of PTA suspects with unresolved cases had been held for 5 to 15 years. More than 600 people were arrested under the PTA between 2019 and 2022. Data released in 2024 showed high acquittal rates.
Behind the numbers are lives. Vasanthi Raghupathy Sharma, a mother of three, spent more than 15 years in detention before her acquittal in 2015. Chandrabose Selvachandran was held for about 14 years, acquitted in 2019, and died 18 months later. Nadesu Kuganathan, a rehabilitated former combatant, was re-arrested and held about eight years without ever being charged.
The law has also been turned on those who speak. Journalist J. S. Tissainayagam was sentenced to 20 years for his writing. Poet Ahnaf Jazeem spent 19 months in custody over a book of Tamil poetry. Lawyer Hejaaz Hizbullah was held for nearly two years; the Court of Appeal found the Act’s draconian elements had been misused against him. Student leader Wasantha Mudalige was detained in 2022 over peaceful protests. In March 2026, the Supreme Court ruled his arrest had no legal basis.
Because confessions to police are admissible, the PTA invites torture and makes it easy to turn a grudge into a charge. No government has apologised to those later found innocent, compensated them, or held any official to account.
Old habits under a new government
The present Government promised a break from this past. Its record is mixed. The Human Rights Commission recorded 46 PTA detentions in 2025 and 12 more in the first quarter of 2026.
In March 2025, Mohamed Rusdi, a 22-year-old shop worker, was detained on an order signed by the President as Minister of Defence. His offence was pasting stickers in a Colombo mall criticising a foreign state. Police later admitted this was not a PTA offence, yet he was placed under a restriction order on release. The Commission found his arrest unlawful and arbitrary. In June 2026, Tamil hip-hop artist Sangeethan Ganeshkumar, 24, was detained over a music video.
Ministers say the PTA is now used mainly against organised crime and drug gangs. But in March 2026 the Supreme Court held that it cannot lawfully be used for ordinary crimes. We do not claim this Government means to repeat the worst abuses of the past. But detention on thin grounds by executive order, with release only after public outcry, is a familiar pattern. A law does not become safe because those who hold it today promise to use it well.
Laws outlive the people who pass them
No party knows the PTA better than the JVP, the heart of today’s Government. In 1983 it was banned on a false charge. In the years that followed, thousands of its members were detained, and many were killed or disappeared. For decades, its MPs were among the PTA’s fiercest critics. Today’s President was one of them.
The UNP government of 1979 never imagined the JVP would one day hold these powers. Governments change; powers remain. So every Member of Parliament should ask one question: would I trust these powers in the hands of my political opponents? If not, they should not exist.
The 2018 Counter-Terrorism Bill and the 2023 Anti-Terrorism Bills were condemned as repackaged PTAs; none became law. This Government’s own December 2025 draft was withdrawn. The new version keeps most of the same powers. If it passes, the NPP will face the charge it once laid against others, and it will be hard to deny.
What Parliament should do
We do not ask Parliament to leave Sri Lanka defenceless. We ask it to protect the country without repeating the injustices of the past 47 years. That means seven things:
- Impose an immediate moratorium on the use of the PTA.
- Consult openly with PTA victims, affected communities, the Bar, civil society, and the Human Rights Commission, then table an amended Bill.
- Define terrorism narrowly, in line with the UN model definition.
- Place every detention under judicial control, with detainees brought promptly before a magistrate.
- Make confessions to police inadmissible and prosecute ordinary crimes under ordinary criminal law.
- Repeal the PTA as soon as the amended Bill is passed.
- Remedy past harm: review remaining PTA cases, release those held without charge or trial, and offer an apology and reparation.
We appeal to every Member, in government and in opposition: do not vote for this Bill as it stands.
This Government has a rare chance. Its mandate is not merely to rename the PTA, but to end the system of unchecked power that made it abusive. It can keep Sri Lankans safe and keep them free. A government that listens will earn the people’s respect.
