Police have arrested 41 people, including five women, after raiding an illegal party organised through social media in the Teldeniya police division, Ada Derana and NewsFirst both reported.

The raid was carried out by officers from the Teldeniya Police Station acting on information received, and narcotics were seized at the scene.

Hiru News, reporting the same operation, placed it at a hotel in the Aluthwatta area of Digana and said the raid followed information received by the Officer-in-Charge of the Teldeniya Police Station, Chief Inspector M. D. Chandrapala.

What was seized

Police recovered 947 milligrams of cannabis, 3.657 grams of hashish and 1.276 grams of ‘Ice’ — crystal methamphetamine — along with 18 ecstasy pills and 21 illicit cigarettes. Officers also took 35 cans of beer and 13 bottles of arrack.

The quantities are small relative to the number of people detained, consistent with possession for personal use at the gathering rather than a trafficking stock.

Who was arrested

The male suspects are aged between 21 and 40 and are residents of Gelioya, Aluthwatta, Warakapola, Peradeniya, Ampitiya, Kandy and Hanguranketha. The five women, aged between 22 and 43, are from Pallekele, Peradeniya, Hanguranketha, Dehiwala and Katugastota, police said.

The spread of home towns — reaching well beyond the Kandy district to Warakapola and Dehiwala — reflects the way such events are advertised, drawing attendees who travel in for a single night.

Not the first at Teldeniya

The area has been raided before on the same grounds. Hiru News reported on 13 December 2025 that police in the Teldeniya division arrested 22 men and four women in the early hours at a “Facebook party” held inside a hotel near the Victoria Reservoir, seizing illegal drugs.

That makes today’s operation the second such raid reported in the same locality inside nine months, and this one is substantially larger. Digana sits on the Victoria Reservoir, close to where the December raid took place, but Hiru News did not say whether the same hotel was involved.

What happens to the suspects

All those detained are to be examined by the Judicial Medical Officer before being produced before the Teldeniya Magistrate’s Court, Hiru News reported. The suspects are young people who had travelled in from various parts of the country.

No organiser has been named, no charges have been specified, and none of the three outlets stated the time of the raid.

The outlets disagree on how many were arrested

Ada Derana and NewsFirst both report 41 people detained, including five women — implying 36 men. Hiru News reports 43, giving a breakdown of 38 men and five women.

The three accounts agree exactly on the number of women and on every other particular, including the seizure inventory and the home towns of those arrested. Only the total, and the men’s count within it, differ. Neither figure has been corrected or flagged by any outlet, and police have not issued a number of their own.

The arrests come as police continue a broad narcotics enforcement drive that has run through the year, with more than 531,000 drug-related arrests recorded since the government took office.

Sources