Ranil Wickremesinghe Violated Fundamental Rights: Supreme Court

25-Jul-2025

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The Supreme Court has ruled that the emergency regulations declared by then-President Ranil Wickremesinghe on July 17, 2022, under Gazette Extraordinary No. 2288/30 of the Public Security Ordinance to suppress the ‘Aragalaya’ people's movement, were arbitrary and unlawful.

The court held that by enforcing emergency law, former President Ranil Wickremesinghe violated the fundamental rights of the people.

In this case, five fundamental rights petitions were filed, naming as respondents: the then-Attorney General, former Presidential Secretary Gamini Senarath, subsequent Secretary to the President Saman Ekanayake, former Defence Secretary Retired General Kamal Gunaratne, former IGP C.D. Wickramaratne, and the Attorney General.

Delivering a 66-page majority ruling, Supreme Court Justice Yasanta Kodagoda, with the concurrence of Chief Justice Jayantha Jayasuriya, upheld the petitions.

However, Justice Arjuna Obeysekera, part of the three-judge bench, issued a 26-page dissenting judgment, stating that the emergency regulations were not unlawful.

Despite this, the majority decision found that Ranil Wickremesinghe had violated Article 12(1) of the Constitution, which guarantees that “All persons are equal before the law and entitled to equal protection of the law.”

The petitions were filed after the state of emergency imposed on July 17, 2022, allegedly infringed upon constitutionally protected fundamental rights.