Prof. Anuradha Seneviratna

Prof. Anuradha Seneviratna was a Senior Professor in the Department of Sinhala University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. Earlier he has served in the University of Colombo and the Institute of Aesthetic Studies as its Director. He has so far written and published nearly seventy books in Sinhala and English on various aspects of Sri Lanka’s culture and civilization. His most popular books were the publications by the Archaeological Survey Department and the publications of the Central Cultural Fund on various Archaeological monuments and sites in Sri Lanka.

He obtained his doctorate in comparative Indo-Aryan languages from the University of Halle. He won a Fulbright Senior Research Award in 1977 and spent his sabbatical at the Folklore Institute of the Indiana University in Bloomington and the University of California in Berkeley U.S.A.

He won the Commonwealth Academic Staff Fellowship in 1998 and was elected to a Visiting Fellowship at Oxford University, U.K. In 1998 he was appointed Senior fellow of the SOAS University of London where he taught for two years. He toured widely on invitations addressing many academic organizations. In the year 1994, the government of Sri Lanka conferred on him the National Honours – Kala Keerti in recognition of his services to the country

Similarly, the Malwathu Mahaviharaya in Kandy which is the prime buddhist Monastic institution in Sri Lanka conferred on him the honorary title Dharma Sashtra Visharadha Kirti Sri for his contribution to Buddhist scholarship. He was also the Chairman of the Arts Council of Sri Lanka.