HABARANA, Sri Lanka —A consultant general surgeon at the District General Hospital in Polonnaruwa was killed on Friday afternoon when the car he was driving collided head-on with a sand-laden tipper truck on the Minneriya-Habarana main road, the police said.
The surgeon, Dr. Rohana Gamage, 49, lived in Polonnaruwa New Town. He was driving from Minneriya toward Habarana when the crash occurred at about 3 p.m. at the seventh milepost, an area known locally as Hathe Kanuwa, the police said. The truck was traveling in the opposite direction, from Habarana toward Minneriya.
Dr. Gamage was taken to Habarana Divisional Hospital with serious injuries and died after admission. His body was held at the hospital and was to be transferred to the Polonnaruwa hospital for a post-mortem examination. His car was badly damaged.
The College of Surgeons of Sri Lanka, of which he was a member, confirmed his death.
Dr. Gamage was on his way from Polonnaruwa to Matale for a musical evening that friends on the clinic staff at the Matale hospital had arranged privately, according to people who knew him. The gathering was to mark his birthday, which fell a few days earlier, and his transfer to Polonnaruwa.
The crash took place near a roadside devale, or shrine, close to Habarana. The stretch has a history of serious accidents. In September, a private bus traveling from Medirigiriya to Colombo left the road and overturned into a canal at a bend near the seventh milepost in Minneriya, injuring 22 people.
Dr. Gamage served at the Matale hospital until his recent transfer to Polonnaruwa, and earlier at the hospital in Batticaloa. He also saw patients at a private channeling center in Matale.
Colleagues remembered him as a highly skilled surgeon who was devoted to his patients. “He seemed a little stern from the outside, but at heart he was as gentle as a child,” said a tribute shared by people who worked with him.
Sri Lanka Police recorded 1,693 road deaths in the first seven and a half months of 2026. Senior Superintendent Manoj Ranagala, who heads the police traffic and road safety division, has said that more than 2,500 people are killed on the country’s roads each year.
The College of Surgeons said funeral arrangements would be announced in due course.
