The Batalanda torture chamber was first exposed by ‘Ravaya’ newspaper. Corruption and terror of the 17-year U.N.P. government were revealed by the ‘Ravaya’ newspaper. However, it is said this was done according to Chandrika’s political agenda. When the U.N.P. nominated Gamini Dissanayake to contest the 1994 presidential election with Chandrika, ‘Ravaya’ publicized Gamini’s misuse of state vehicles. With that revelation, Chandrika’s government filed a complaint against Gamini with the Bribery Commission.
Ranil was in a deal with Chandrika during this period. That was to end Gamini’s politics. When Ranil lost the opposition leader election to Gamini, the deal functioned. Chandrika took on the task of filing bribery charges against Gamini, while Ranil took on the task of pulling Gamini’s leg and defeating him. After the LTTE killed Gamini, Ranil became the leader of the UNP and the opposition. Following this ‘Ravaya’ revealed about the Batalanda torture camp, grasping well that Ranil is Chandrika’s target.
After the ‘Ravaya’ exposure, Chandrika set up over a dozen presidential commissions. All of those commissions targeted the 17-year UNP government. The Batalanda Commission was one among them, as was the commission appointed to investigate the allegations against Wijepala Mendis, a powerful minister in the UNP government and the then chief organizer of the opposition. The corruption charge against Wijepala Mendis was an accusation of transferring a barren land in Anuradhapura belonging to Wijepala to fertile coconut land in Dankotuwa. The presidential commission found Wijepala guilty of this charge. The presidential commission also recommended the annulment of Wijepala’s civic rights. The motion to cancel Wijepala’s civic rights was scheduled to be brought to Parliament in the last week of October 1997. It was to be presented by the then Prime Minister, Sirimavo Bandaranaike.
A proposal to abolish Wijepala’s civic rights set off a bomb in Sirikotha. The UNP’s new MPs, including the party leader and opposition leader Ranil and party secretary Gamini Athukorala, thought that either Wijepala should be removed from the party or his MP post should be terminated or support the proposal to abolish his civic rights. This was because they believed that the reason for the UNP’s defeat in 1994 was the party’s history of terror and corruption and that the party’s senior leaders related to that history should be removed one by one and the party should be made a clean party.
Ranil also strongly accepted this view, even though Ranil was directly related to the party’s history of terror and corruption. Ranil appointed a committee headed by the party secretary Gamini Athukorala, with the working committee, to investigate the allegations against Wijepala Mendis and expel him from the party.
The committee decided that Wijepala should be expelled from the party. This decision angered the senior leaders of the party. Hameed, the former party chairman and a senior leader, insisted that Wijepala should be protected until the charges levelled against him by the Presidential Commission were proven in court. However, when the disciplinary committee began its investigation against Wijepala, Hameed resigned from the committee. UNP MP Anura Bandaranaike also appeared on Wijepala’s behalf. M.H. Mohamed, Pestus Perera, Dharmadasa Banda, Nanda Mathew, A.M.S. Adhikari, and Susil Munasinghe were firm in their opinion that the party should protect Wijepala.
While Sirikotha was burning with the shocking proposal to abolish the civic rights of Wijepala, he went to the Supreme Court against the recommendations of the Presidential Commission. However, the Working Committee approved the recommendation made by the Athukorala Committee to abolish Wijepala’s party membership.
Chandrika took advantage of this opportunity and launched a campaign to win over senior UNP MPs who opposed Ranil’s decision to expel Wijepala by suppressing the motion to revoke his civil rights. Her campaign was successful. In the meantime, the verdict in the case filed against the Wijepala Commission was announced. The Supreme Court said that Wijepala was not guilty of the charges. The Supreme Court also ordered Wijepala to be paid court charges.
The team including Ranil who expelled Wijepala from the UNP was blamed. When the crisis erupted, Chandrika fished out senior party members, including Wijepala, from the party. The UNP collapsed on all fours.
Meanwhile, the term of the Batalanda Presidential Commission was also approaching its end. The Batalanda Commission was being led by Chandrika’s political cronies Mangala and S.B. Mangala, and S.B. wanted to either arrest Ranil or revoke Ranil’s civic rights. The main headline in Mangala’s state media at that time was Batalanda. Ranil also had to appear in the commission to give testimony. Ranil went to testify before the commission accompanied by U.N.P. party members. By Ranil’s testimony, Chandrika government got boosted. Ranil had been accused in the commission report as planned by Chandrika’s government. The commission report went into the dustbin. Mangala and S.B., who were waiting to put Ranil in jail and revoke his civic rights, were left speechless.
When the Batalanda report was released, the ‘Ravaya newspaper and the editor of ‘Ravaya’, Victor Ivan, who had exposed the Batalanda torture camp, were with Ranil. At this time, Ravaya’s main enemy was Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva. ‘Ravaya fearlessly published the allegations against the Chief Justice in the newspaper. Victor Ivan wanted Ranil to bring an impeachment motion against the Chief Justice.
He got the UNP leaders to agree to it, but Ranil backed down. The reason for this, Victor said, was that there was a secret agreement with Sarath N. Silva, who was Attorney General and later became the Chief Justice, when the commission was investigating the Batalanda Commission to defeat the political plan of Chandrika’s government to send Ranil to prison.
Because Ranil sabotaged the impeachment of the Chief Justice, Victor, along with Deputy Leader Karu Jayasuriya and General Secretary Gamini Athukorala, launched a rebellion against Ranil. The rebellion was suppressed when Ranil agreed to impeach Sarath N. Silva. However, Chandrika dissolved Parliament without allowing the impeachment to be heard. Ranil became Prime Minister in the general election that followed. Victor Ivan again brought the motion to remove Sarath N. Silva.
Karu launched a big fight for it. But Ranil did not want to remove Sarath N. Silva. Even then, not only Victor but many party members said that there was a deal between Ranil and Sarath N. Silva regarding Batalanda.
Whatever the truth is, at the end, S.B., Mangala and Chandrika, who wanted to jail Rani on Batalanda, joined with Ranil.
It was Wijepala Mendis who tabled the Batalanda report in Parliament. Ranil, who had expelled him from the party to protect the party from corruption when the Presidential Commission accused him of corruption, was very angry with Wijepala for using the Batalanda Commission report against him.
They joined Chandrika thinking that she would send Ranil to jail through the Batalanda Commission. They thought that they would then go back to the UNP and seize power. But when the Commission report was suppressed, they were angry.
The Batalanda Commission is a magic wand that has stirred Sri Lankan politics. Fairy tales say that the magic wand destroys those who use it to perform magic. It is still impossible to say who will be destroyed by the Batalanda magic wand Bimal gives Anura.
