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The prelate and the premier: Why Buddharakkitha Thera got S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike murdered-by D.B.S Jeyaraj S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike Source:FT Sri Lanka’s newly elected President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has appointed Dr. Harini Amarasuriya as his Prime Minister. The academic turned politico is Sri Lanka’s third woman Prime Minister. The first woman PM of the island nation was Sirimavo Bandaranaike. Sirimavo shattered a global glass ceiling in 1960 by becoming the world’s first woman Prime Minister. Her daughter Chandrika Kumaratunga became the second woman PM in 1994. Subsequently she too made history as Sri Lanka’s first woman President. As is well known, Sirimavo and Chandrika were the wife and daughter of former Prime Minister Solomon West Ridgeway Dias Bandaranaike (SWRDB) respectively. Prime Minister Bandaranaike was killed in 1959. He died on 26 September 1959. SWRDB was born on 8 January 1899. As such this year marks the 125th birth and 65th death anniversaries of ...