Child rights advocate Dr. Tushara Wickramanayaka has argued that a child’s consent matters more than sorting physical contact into “good touch” and “bad touch”, saying any contact made without that consent can itself be a bad touch.
The comments came in a social media post accompanied by two photographs of politicians with children, the Daily Mirror and Hiru News both reported.
The argument
The traditional good-touch/bad-touch framework should sit alongside a child’s own right to decide whether they are comfortable being touched, Wickramanayaka said. Giving children the standing to grant or refuse consent empowers them, and that — rather than the categorisation of contact — should be the message communicated to society.
The Daily Mirror reported that the post also criticised the failure to fully implement the National Child Protection Policy, arguing children remain vulnerable where protection mechanisms are not properly enforced, and called for age-appropriate sexuality education.
The two photographs
Wickramanayaka described the interaction shown in the first photograph, involving a politician, as inappropriate. Neither outlet names that politician.
The second was taken when a petition carrying about 40,000 signatures was handed to Parliament by the Stop Child Cruelty Trust. Hiru News reported that in that image Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa asked a boy whether it was acceptable to place a hand on his shoulder before doing so — an exchange Wickramanayaka cited as an example of respecting a child’s right to consent, and said she was surprised to hear.
The Daily Mirror’s account emphasises a different aspect of the same photograph: that the event was crowded, and that the two children pictured, along with their parents, work with the Stop Child Cruelty Trust. Read together, the two reports suggest the post both criticised one politician’s conduct and explained the context of the second image.
Naming
The Daily Mirror gives the advocate’s name as Tushara Wickramanayaka; Hiru News writes Thushara Wickramanayake. LankaNewz has followed the Daily Mirror’s spelling.
