by Durga Velayudham
“Justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.” — Gordon Hewart
The question confronting Sri Lanka extends far beyond whether criminal accountability is being pursued in the aftermath of the Easter Sunday terrorist attacks. It concerns whether the administration of justice can credibly command public confidence when officials whose own conduct has attracted serious adverse findings in official inquiries continue to occupy some of the most influential offices within the very institutions entrusted with enforcing the law.
The majority judgment delivered yesterday by the Colombo High Court Trial-at-Bar against former Inspector General of Police Pujith Jayasundara stands among the most significant criminal determinations in Sri Lanka’s judicial history. By a majority of two to one, the court concluded that the former Inspector General repeatedly received credible intelligence warnings of an imminent terrorist attack yet failed to discharge the statutory and constitutional obligations inherent in his office. That omission, according to the majority, constituted criminal culpability warranting the ultimate sentence prescribed by law. The judgment remains subject to appellate review, and its legal finality is therefore unresolved. Its constitutional significance, however, is already unmistakable. It affirms that command responsibility is not an abstract principle of public administration but a justiciable legal duty capable of attracting personal criminal liability where a conscious failure to act contributes to catastrophic loss of life.
That principle admits no selective application.
The Easter Sunday attacks did not expose the failure of a single office or institution. They revealed systemic deficiencies spanning intelligence collection, intelligence dissemination, operational policing, executive decision-making and the subsequent criminal investigation. Where institutional failure is collective, scrutiny cannot legitimately become individualised. Every official entrusted with authority before, during or after the attacks must remain answerable in proportion to the responsibilities vested in that office.
It is within that legal and institutional context that the continued prominence of Ravi Seneviratne and Shani Abeysekara warrants legitimate public examination. Both occupied senior command positions within the Criminal Investigation Department during the investigation into the Easter Sunday attacks. Their conduct subsequently became the subject of adverse observations in official inquiries. Most notably, the committee chaired by retired Judge A. N. J. de Alwis criticised significant aspects of the CID investigation and recommended that criminal proceedings be considered against both officers for alleged negligence in the discharge of their investigative responsibilities. Those recommendations remain disputed, have not culminated in criminal convictions and carry no judicial determination of guilt. That legal distinction is fundamental. Equally fundamental, however, is the proposition that serious official findings do not cease to exist merely because they remain unresolved.
The issue is therefore neither one of presumed guilt nor one of predetermined criminal liability. It concerns institutional legitimacy. Public confidence in the administration of justice is inevitably placed under strain when individuals who remain associated with unresolved official criticism arising from the very same national tragedy continue to exercise substantial influence within the machinery responsible for securing accountability.
This principle is firmly embedded within the common law tradition. In the House of Lords decision in Pinochet (No. 2), the court vacated its own judgment because an undisclosed association created an appearance capable of undermining public confidence, notwithstanding the absence of any finding of actual impropriety. Likewise, Porter v Magill established that the governing question is whether a fair-minded and informed observer would conclude that there exists a real possibility of bias. These authorities are not confined to judicial conduct. They articulate a broader constitutional doctrine: the legitimacy of legal processes depends not solely upon their actual fairness but upon their objective appearance to an informed public.
That doctrine possesses equal force in criminal investigations. Across established legal systems, investigators whose impartiality becomes reasonably contestable are routinely recused, reassigned or replaced. Such measures do not constitute findings of misconduct. They are institutional safeguards designed to preserve the integrity, independence and public credibility of the investigative process itself. The administration of justice cannot permit avoidable questions concerning impartiality to overshadow the pursuit of truth.
Sri Lanka cannot credibly demand a lower threshold.
The Easter Sunday investigation has become fragmented by overlapping commissions, competing official reports, inconsistent investigative conclusions and successive political narratives that frequently contradict one another. Victims and their families have endured years of institutional discord while responsibility has been transferred between agencies, commissions and governments. The recent Trial-at-Bar judgment has now determined, at first instance, that the country’s highest-ranking police officer incurred criminal liability through a failure to respond to intelligence warnings. Yet other officials whose conduct has likewise attracted adverse official scrutiny continue to hold positions of considerable authority. Whether that circumstance reflects institutional confidence, political expediency or some other consideration is a matter upon which the public is fully entitled to seek answers.
Political authority has always possessed the capacity to appoint, promote, reinstate or protect public officials. It possesses no corresponding power to extinguish unresolved questions of accountability. Executive confidence cannot displace institutional scrutiny. Appointment to high office is not evidence of exoneration, nor does political endorsement acquire the legal effect of absolution. Public office confers authority; it does not confer immunity from legitimate examination.
The burden of preserving confidence in the justice system does not rest exclusively upon governments or the courts. It rests equally upon those entrusted with enforcing the law. Where serious official criticism remains unresolved, transparency is not an act of generosity but an incident of public duty. Independent scrutiny should not be resisted by those who profess confidence in their own conduct. It should be welcomed as the only process capable of restoring institutional legitimacy.
The Easter Sunday attacks claimed hundreds of innocent lives and inflicted one of the gravest constitutional failures in the Republic’s history. If the law is capable of reaching the office of the Inspector General of Police, no lesser standard can govern any other public official whose conduct remains the subject of serious unresolved official scrutiny. The rule of law either operates without distinction or it ceases to operate as a rule. Once accountability becomes contingent upon office, influence or political convenience, it is no longer accountability at all.
