Foundation stones for four hospital development projects worth a combined Rs. 7,148 million will be laid on September 16 under the patronage of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, the Daily Mirror reported on Monday evening.
The projects are in Anuradhapura, Trincomalee, Mannar and Mullaitivu, and are aimed at expanding specialised care across the Northern, North Central and Eastern provinces. They are funded through Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) loans and Government of India grants.
What is being built
| Project | District | Cost | Funder |
|---|---|---|---|
| Eight-storey cardiac care complex | Anuradhapura Teaching Hospital | Rs. 3,545mn | JICA loan |
| Eight-storey cardiac care complex | Trincomalee District General Hospital | Rs. 2,403mn | JICA loan |
| Emergency, accident and critical care complex | Mannar District General Hospital | Rs. 600mn | Indian grant |
| Four-storey ward complex | Mullaitivu District General Hospital | Rs. 600mn | Indian grant |
The two cardiac care complexes account for Rs. 5,948 million — 83% of the total — and are to be equipped for the diagnosis and treatment of heart disease, with intensive and coronary care units, catheterisation laboratories, wards, clinics, laboratories, X-ray and ECG facilities, and libraries and auditoriums.
The Mannar complex will handle emergency, accident and trauma cases. The Mullaitivu ward complex is intended to relieve overcrowding. The Mannar and Mullaitivu projects together draw on Rs. 1,200 million in Indian grant assistance.
JICA Sri Lanka Chief Representative Shigeo Honzu and Japanese Ambassador Akio Isomata are due to attend, as is Indian High Commissioner Santosh Jha.
The Mullaitivu ward complex is already under construction
One point the Daily Mirror does not address: work on the Mullaitivu complex appears to have started months ago.
The Daily FT reported on 15 May 2026 that construction of the four-storeyed medical ward complex at Mullaitivu District General Hospital had commenced, under an Indian grant of the same Rs. 600 million, following a Memorandum of Understanding signed between High Commissioner Santosh Jha and Acting Health Ministry Secretary W.K. Wickremasinghe during the April visit of Indian Vice President C.P. Radhakrishnan. That report placed the project inside the India–Sri Lanka High Impact Community Development Project framework, under which it said 18 grant-funded projects were then running, and projected that the hospital’s bed occupancy rate would rise by more than 150% on completion.
That report is four months old and therefore outside the window for citation here, and it is offered as background rather than as a source. But if it is accurate, Wednesday’s ceremony marks a formal start for at least one project on which work was already under way. No outlet reconciles the two accounts.
Context
The government has been working through a backlog of stalled health infrastructure. It moved earlier this year to restart Rs. 45 billion worth of suspended hospital projects, and a Rs. 12 billion, 16-storey heart centre at the National Hospital was announced in June. A Rs. 20 billion plan for Anuradhapura’s hospital was set out in May.
Update (16 September): ceremony under way, a second outlet confirms the figures
The foundation stone laying for the Anuradhapura and Trincomalee cardiac care complexes is taking place on Wednesday under the patronage of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, NewsFirst reported.
Deputy Minister of Health Dr. Hansaka Wijayamuni said Rs. 5,948 million will be spent on the two cardiac projects under JICA assistance — a figure that matches the Daily Mirror’s arithmetic exactly (Rs. 3,545mn plus Rs. 2,403mn), independently confirming the cost breakdown from a government source.
The Deputy Minister confirmed that foundation stones will also be laid on Wednesday for the two ward complexes at Mullaitivu and Mannar, so all four ceremonies are proceeding on the same day.
Two small differences of emphasis are worth noting. NewsFirst describes the cardiac funding simply as “JICA assistance” where the Daily Mirror specifies JICA loans; and NewsFirst calls the Mannar project a ward complex, while the Daily Mirror describes it as an emergency, accident and critical care complex. Neither outlet mentions the Indian grant funding for the Mannar and Mullaitivu projects, which only the Daily Mirror reported.
NewsFirst adds no completion timelines, contractor names or capacity figures, and does not address whether work at Mullaitivu had already begun.
Construction has begun, and the completion dates are now on the record
Later reporting on Wednesday confirms work started rather than merely being inaugurated, and supplies the completion timelines listed as missing below.
Trincomalee. Construction of the cardiac care complex at Trincomalee District General Hospital commenced on Wednesday under the President’s patronage, NewsFirst reported. The eight-storey building will hold operating theatres, outpatient facilities, inpatient wards and laboratory services, and is scheduled for completion by May 2028. NewsFirst puts the cost at Rs. 2.403 billion — matching the Daily Mirror’s figure to the million — and places it under the Healthcare and Medical Services Improvement Project, funded by the Government of Japan through JICA. That is the first time the parent programme has been named. President Dissanayake unveiled a commemorative plaque marking the start of work.
Hiru News independently confirms the Trincomalee figures — Rs. 2,403 million, eight storeys, JICA funding, completion “around May 2028” — and attributes the completion date to the Presidential Media Division, which no other outlet names as the source. It describes the unit’s purpose as providing comprehensive cardiac care to the Eastern Province from a single location, and lists state-of-the-art operating theatres, outpatient departments, inpatient facilities and fully equipped laboratories. A third newsroom on the same figures settles the cost and timeline beyond doubt.
Mannar. Construction of the Accident and Emergency Care Unit at Mannar District General Hospital also began Wednesday, NewsFirst and the Daily Mirror both report, with completion scheduled for the first quarter of 2028. Both confirm the Rs. 600 million Indian grant funding — the Daily Mirror’s original figure, now corroborated by a second outlet. NewsFirst adds that the government has separately taken steps on medical equipment, staffing and other resources for the hospital.
The Mannar naming question is settled. NewsFirst called it a “ward complex” in its earlier Wednesday report; both its own later report and the Daily Mirror now describe it as an accident and emergency care unit, which is the Daily Mirror’s original description. The earlier NewsFirst usage appears to have been an error.
Indian High Commissioner Santosh Jha attended the Mannar ceremony as expected and used it to set out India’s wider project list in Sri Lanka, including a US$15 million northern railway signalling scheme and hybrid renewable energy systems on three islands off Jaffna.
What remains unreported is whether the President attended all four sites or only some; no outlet has filed on the Anuradhapura or Mullaitivu ceremonies, and the question of whether work at Mullaitivu had already begun months ago is still unaddressed.
Not reported
The Daily Mirror gives no completion timelines for any of the four projects, no contractor names, and no bed or capacity figures. It does not say what the JICA loan terms are, whether the two cardiac complexes fall under the existing JICA health sector programme or a new facility, or where the ceremonies will physically be held. It does not say whether the President will attend all four sites or one. NewsFirst’s 16 September report, added above, answers none of these.
