By M.R. Narayan Swamy
The Sri Lankan government wants former intelligence chief Suresh Sallay, whose health has become precarious after launching a hunger strike in custody, to die because it cannot prove that he was in any way involved in the 2019 Easter bombings that killed 269 people, one of his lawyers alleges.
This is the reason the retired Major General has been forced to undergo “inhuman treatment” in CID custody so that he breaks psychologically and commits suicide, one of Sally’s lawyers and former cabinet minister Udaya Gammanpila said.
Sallay, 58, was hurriedly admitted to the Colombo National Hospital for emergency treatment on Sunday after his health weakened sharply in the wake of the hunger strike, which he launched two nights earlier because of what his family says is a sadistic treatment meted out to him.
"With the Catholic Church pressuring the government, he has been subjected to inhuman treatment so that he is compelled to commit suicide,” Gammanpila told Jaffna Monitor. “The government wants to see him dead. Only then can the government survive.
According to Gammanpila, the government was by then fully aware that Sallay, the former Director of the State Intelligence Service (SIS), who has been in custody since February 25, played no part in the 2019 Easter bombings that killed 269 people and were claimed by the Sri Lankan affiliate of the Islamic State.
The prosecution alleges that Sallay was complicit in the Easter bombings in order to create an atmosphere of insecurity that could help propel former Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa—widely credited with crushing the Tamil Tigers—to power. Gotabaya went on to win the presidential election held months after the bombings and subsequently appointed Sallay as head of the SIS.
Gammanpila alleged that if Sallay were to die, the government and those arrayed against him would be able to claim that they were unable to prove his role in the bombings because he was no more.
The irony of this sordid drama was that two officers who had been accused of negligence for ignoring intelligence warnings from within and neighbouring India about the Easter attacks now held critical levers of power in the security apparatus and had acted against Sallay with a vengeance, he said.
Sallay’s wife, Manori, also insisted that her husband was “completely innocent” and said the government was targeting him with a view to eventually going after former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.
“They know he is not involved. They want to find a scapegoat… It is a political grudge. They are hitting Suresh because they cannot hit Gotabaya… Through Suresh, they want to get Gotabaya,” she told Jaffna Monitor hours after visiting her husband for the first time in custody on Sunday.
A graduate in business administration from New Delhi’s Maitreyi College, she said she was shocked after seeing his condition in custody.
“I couldn’t believe what I saw. He was very frail and extremely weak. He had become alarmingly thin, almost like a skeleton. They are not giving him proper food, and what they do serve is often spoiled,” she said.
“Believe it or not, he looked malnourished. His eyesight has become weak, he has blood sugar too. They have tortured him mentally, and severely at that. Even the medical report says that,” she said.
“When I saw him, he could not even walk. He had to be supported by two men. I just cannot believe what they have done to him.”
The last straw was when the CID served him on Friday rice and curry on a piece of paper. The paper got torn, and the food spilled onto the floor when he touched it. That broke Sallay, forcing him to launch his protest fast.
Although Manori had been speaking to him on the telephone regularly, it was their 21-year-old son who used to visit his father every Saturday. But when she heard that he had gone on a hunger strike on Friday, Manori wanted to see him, and she got ten minutes of visitation time.
According to attorney-at-law Asith Siriwardena, the lead counsel representing Suresh Sallay, the former intelligence chief, has informed his family that he has refused all medication, saline, food, and water in protest against his alleged degrading treatment, and has warned that he believes his death is imminent.
Sallay also sought an immediate visit from his attorney to execute his last will.
In an open letter to G.S. Abesekara, Director of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), the attorney warned that if Sallay suffered irreversible injury or death while in custody, “those responsible for decisions concerning his continued detention and medical care may be required to account personally for their actions and omissions”.
Sallay’s son, Kushal, has meantime told the media that his father wants the government to immediately repeal the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), under which he is held and which he (Sallay) himself used against countless others over long years.
Human rights groups and countless others in Sri Lanka and abroad have been clamouring for the repeal of the PTA, which was enacted in 1979 and has been used mostly against Tamils, as well as members of the now-ruling Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP). The JVP promised to repeal the PTA before coming to power, but has not kept its word.
On his part, Sallay has repeatedly denied any links with the Easter bombers and pointed out that he was in Malaysia, where he was a Minister Counsellor in the Sri Lankan mission, when the horrific attacks took place in Colombo and elsewhere, killing 269 people and injuring and maiming hundreds.
Manori said Sallay had thought there could be trouble for him when the JVP formed the government in 2024, as they had campaigned on the pledge of ferreting out the “truth” about the Easter bombings, which a section of the Christian clergy believes involved a political hand acting in concert with Islamist radicals. “We knew they were targeting him.”
But she admitted she never thought the family would have to see such dark days.
“Imagine, they have put him in a cell that is more like a cage. The light is on 24/7. He is made to sleep on the floor. The cell is infested with rats. He is not allowed to use the toilet after a certain time.
“Even a convicted prisoner has some rights. I didn’t even know that such things existed in Sri Lanka.”
Manori, a Buddhist married to Sallay, a Malay Muslim, said that while their son was handling the situation with courage, their 17-year-old daughter was constantly fearful that her father “is going to die.”
