Colombo’s Chief Magistrate Court has issued an arrest warrant for former convict and extremist monk Galagodaaththe Gnanasara after he ignored a court summon over charges of hate speech he directed towards Muslims.

Gnanasara’s defense council were unable to present a valid reason for his absence.

Gnanasara, General Secretary of the Sinhala chauvinist Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) has a history of racist rhetoric against Muslims and Tamils. In 2014, prior to the anti-Muslim riots, he told a cheering Sinhala nationalist crowd in Aluthgama that “if one marakkalaya ( Muslim) lays a hand on a Sinhalese that will be the end of all of them”. The resulting violence killed four people and left 80 injured, with hundreds left homeless. Amongst the sites attacked were mosques, Muslim homes, businesses, and even a nursery.

In 2018, Gnanasara was sentenced to six months in prison for threatening the wife of Prageeth Eknaligoda; a journalist who was forcibly disappeared following critical reporting of Sri Lankan war crimes. He was however released from prison following a presidential pardon. 

Speaking to Tamil Guardian, Eknaligoda’s wife, Sandya Ekneligoda expressed her lack of faith in the Sri Lankan judicial system.
“Even though, it is supposed to be independent, I have witnessed enough that, always the executive (president) and the parliamentarians (MPs) have influenced the judiciary. So, the judiciary has become ineffective and if the judges are unable to exercise their powers freely and independently”, she told our journalists.

Following his presidential pardon, Gnanasara was appointed to head a Presidential Task Force focused on achieving “One Country One Law”.