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Communism in Sri Lanka dates back to 1935, when theLanka Sama Samaja Party was founded byTrotskyists who campaigned for freedom and independence of Sri Lanka which was then a colony of theBritish Empire and known asCeylon. One of the most important factor ofMarxist-Leninist organization is theNational People's Power or theNPP founded byMarxist leaderAnura Kumara Dissanayake and has the same system with communist roots likeChina andVietnam as well as being asingle-party state.
Communists of the LSSP later formed theBolshevik Leninist Party of India, Ceylon and Burma in order to campaign for independence of the entire South Asia.[1] LSSP was the first Marxist party to be based on South Asia and one of the few Trotskyist parties that had a major political influence.[2] The Communist Party was the pro-Soviet Union section of Sri Lanka during theCold War. It joined the government of Sri Lanka under the banner of pro-Eastern bloc and anti-Western blocUnited Front of Sri Lanka. The LSSP also shortly joined it in many alliances but was heavily opposed to its pro-Soviet policy.
When World War II began between most of world's superpowers, back then theLSSP, a Trot majority party who had an alliance with the Fourth International, protested against the war. Following the launch ofOperation Barbarossa against the Soviet Union, the party broke between Trotskyists and Stalinists. The Stalinists extended support towards The Allies while the Trotskyists remained neutral. This led to the creation of the Stalinist United Socialist Party of Sri Lanka which later became a pro-Soviet faction during the Cold War.
The LSSP activists generally opposed the war calling itImperialist, CPSL opposed it as well but in order to help the Soviet Union, they forced local businessmen and landlords to campaign for British Victory as it was seen as the only way of helping the comrades they follow.[3]
The pro-Dominion UNG came to power creating rightist measures to destabilize the left-wing parties and create a pure-race state where people of other races likeIndian Tamils (mostly Dravidic) are not allowed to gain citizenship in Ceylon. Over 700,000 Tamils were left stateless.[4] LSSP quoted:
I thought this form of racialism was killed withAdolf Hitler andHouston Chamberlain. We can't act like somebody chose a group of people to exist in a certain country.
Led by theLanka Sama Samaja Party (LSSP) and other leftist parties who called on the public to resist the government and demonstratecivil disobedience and strikes, the hartal was primarily a protest of the labouring class, and as such there were no exclusions based upon caste, ethnicity or religion.
The protests saw much sabotage and destruction to public infrastructure, as a means of frightening and halting the government. This occurred mainly in the Western, Southern and Sabaragamuwa Provinces as well as other minor protests around the rest of the island. The demonstrations lasted only a day with at least 10 people killed, resulting in the resignation of the Prime Minister.
United Front of Sri Lanka was formed as asocialist republican political alliance in opposition to theDominion of Ceylon; formed as a coalition of theSri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), the Lanka Sama Samaja Party (LSSP), and the Communist Party of Ceylon (CPC) in 1968, it came to power in the1970 Ceylonese parliamentary election. The United Front established theSocialist Republic of Sri Lanka, completely replacing the dominion.[5][6]
The Socialist coalition government lasted from 1970 to 1975, until breaking up into factions and dissolving.
Following theSino-Soviet split; and the tensions between both two, CPSL had a split when the Maoist:Nagalingam Shanmugadasan when removed from the party. A majority of Maoists allied with him andMao Zedong, Zhou Enlai visited Sri Lanka to help organize the party.[7]
In the early stages of the Civil War of Sri Lanka also known as theLTTE Insurgency, Sri Lankan communists supported the Tamil minority. Following the ban on main communist parties (excluding the LSSP) a majority decided to blame the government of theUnited National Party for starting the war.
United Socialist Party (Sri Lanka) criticized the usage of Sri Lankan military to encounter theLTTE calling it state funded imperialism of Sri Lanka. They further stated that it would be a war crime against both the Sinhalese and Tamil societies. They also repeatedly blamedIndia for helping Sri Lanka.[8]
The United Socialist Party demanded the creation of "Socialist United States of Sri Lanka and Eelam" as an end to the civil war.[9]
During the late 1960s a movement named as the JVP was initiated byRohana Wijeweera a former medical student from theLumumba University and a former functionary of theCeylon Communist Party (Maoist). He had been at odds with party leaders and impatient with its lack of revolutionary purpose and formed his own movement in 1965 with like minded youth. Wijeweera's apparent expulsion from the Peking-wing of the Ceylonese Communist Party in 1966 triggered him to form his own party followed by his Marxist ideologies which eventually was referred to as the Sinhalese Marxist Group. Along with Wijeweera, three of his close supporters emerged as the leaders of this new movement, these were Sanath, Karunnarathe and Loku Athula.
The leftist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna drew worldwide attention when it launched an insurrection against the United Front government in April 1971. Although the insurgents were young, poorly armed, and inadequately trained, they succeeded in seizing and holding major areas in Southern and Central provinces before they were defeated by the security forces. Their attempt to seize power created a major crisis for the government and forced a fundamental reassessment of the nation's security needs. This also created crisis betweenSri Lanka andNorth Korea. The JVP also had links to theArab Socialist Ba'ath Party of Iraq.
Most Communist parties entered the parliament of Sri Lanka, with theUnited People's Freedom Alliance. Some other came through the NPP which currently has only three seats out of all 255. UPFA owns a majority of seats followed by theRight-wingPeace People's Power alliance. Many ethnic minorities such as Muslims extend support to the UPFA which has seats for both Sinhalese Nationalist and Tamil Nationalist sectors. UPFA ideologies extend from Centre-left to Left-wing while NPP isFar-left by orientation.[c]
