Update, 17 September: The warrants were recalled the following day. Details below.
Colombo Fort Magistrate Pasan Amarasena on Wednesday issued warrants for the arrest of former Sri Lanka cricket captain Aravinda de Silva and his wife, Priyangi Anushka Wijenayake, after the couple failed to appear before the court as bailsmen in the SriLankan Airlines aircraft procurement case, Hiru News reported.
The warrants direct that both be arrested and produced in court.
De Silva and Wijenayake had stood surety for Priyanka Neomali Wijenayake, the widow of former SriLankan Airlines chief executive Kapila Chandrasena, who is a suspect in the case concerning alleged financial irregularities in the purchase of new aircraft for the national carrier. When the matter was called on 16 September, the bailsmen were absent.
A lawyer appearing for the couple told the court that de Silva’s mother had died and that they had been unable to attend for that reason.
Recalled on Thursday
Fort Magistrate Amarasena ordered the warrants recalled on Thursday, 17 September, after President’s Counsel Nalin Ladduwahetty appeared by way of a motion — in writing, without the couple attending — and submitted that they had been unable to come to court the previous day because they were at de Silva’s mother’s funeral, Hiru News reported. Her final rites took place on 16 September, the day the case was called.
The magistrate accepted the explanation and withdrew the warrants, according to the Daily Mirror. They had stood for one day.
Thursday’s reports also supply three facts Wednesday’s coverage did not.
The sum. De Silva and his wife each deposited personal bail of Rs. 20 million for Priyanka Neomali Wijenayake — Rs. 40 million between them.
Why the case was called. The 16 September hearing was listed for the couple to show cause why that bail should not be forfeited. Missing it is what exposed them to the warrants; they were the consequence of an absence from a forfeiture hearing, not of any allegation against either of them.
What the underlying case is. The Daily Mirror describes it as the alleged payment of a USD 2 million bribe connected to SriLankan Airlines’ purchase of Airbus aircraft. Hiru frames the same matter more broadly as alleged financial irregularities in re-establishing a wide-body fleet for the airline, and describes Chandrasena as the late former chief executive.
Neither is a suspect
The distinction matters, and the first report of the warrants did not carry it. The Daily Mirror’s initial filing, published at 11.25 a.m., was a single sentence stating that warrants had been issued, with no case, no reason and no explanation.
On Hiru’s account, de Silva and his wife are before the court only as sureties for another person’s bail. They are not named as suspects, and no allegation is made against either. A warrant against an absent bailsman is a procedural step to secure attendance, not a charge.
De Silva captained Sri Lanka and was player of the match in the 1996 World Cup final, scoring an unbeaten 107 against Australia in Lahore. He later served as a national selector.
How the couple came to stand bail
Chandrasena was a principal suspect in the Airbus bribery and money laundering investigation. He was found dead at de Silva’s residence on 8 May, and de Silva and Wijenayake both gave evidence in May at the Fort Magistrate’s inquest into his death, telling the court they had no suspicions about the cause.
His widow, Priyanka Neomali Wijenayake, was named the second suspect in the Airbus case, and the Colombo Magistrate’s Court issued open arrest warrants for her in April after she failed to appear, along with warrants for former airline board member Shamindra Rajapaksa.
Wednesday’s report establishes what earlier coverage did not: that she was subsequently bailed, and that de Silva and his wife were the sureties.
The same case file is the one into which MP Namal Rajapaksa was recently named a fourth suspect; he was remanded until 23 September by the same magistrate on the same day.
A name that is easily confused
The two Wijenayakes are distinct people and the similarity of their names is a trap worth stating plainly:
- Priyangi Anushka Wijenayake — Aravinda de Silva’s wife, a bailsman, named in Wednesday’s warrants. Her name has also appeared as “Priyanga Anushka Wijenayake” and “Anushka de Silva”. The Daily Mirror spelled it Priyanga; Hiru spelled it Priyangi on Wednesday and Priyanka on Thursday.
- Priyanka Neomali Wijenayake — Kapila Chandrasena’s widow, the Airbus suspect for whom the couple stood bail. Her name has also appeared as “Priyanka Nayomali” and “Priyanka Niyomali”.
Thursday’s Hiru report names both women in consecutive sentences, and in doing so collapses the only reliable distinction between them: with Priyangi rendered as Priyanka, the two are separated by the middle name alone — Anushka for the bailsman, Neomali for the suspect. Readers and reporters working from a single outlet should treat the middle name, not the first, as the identifying element.
Our May coverage of the inquest recorded the two women as sisters. None of the reports across either day states the relationship.
Still not reported
Thursday’s hearing answered three of the questions left open on Wednesday — the sum stood, whether the court accepted the explanation, and whether the warrants would be withdrawn. Four remain.
No outlet says when the couple stood bail. None gives a next court date for the bailsmen, or says whether the forfeiture application has been dismissed outright or merely deferred — the warrants were recalled, but nothing published states that the Rs. 40 million is no longer at risk. None reports whether Priyanka Neomali Wijenayake herself appeared on either day, which is the question that produced the forfeiture hearing in the first place. And none records the relationship between the two Wijenayake women.
One discrepancy carried over from earlier coverage is now effectively settled. The Daily Mirror and Hiru have spelled the magistrate Pasan Amarasena on both days of this hearing, against our own May coverage of the Chandrasena inquest, before the same court, which spelled him Pasan Amarasekara. With four same-week filings from two outlets now agreeing, Amarasena should be treated as correct and the May spelling as the outlier.
