10th Parliament· 154 sittings on record · 30,475 speeches · latest 10 June 2026

The Hon. Harshana Nanayakkara, Attorney-at-Law - Minister of Justice and National Integration

Jathika Jana balawegaya· Colombo· 21 January 2026 ·Oral question: Oral Question No. 2 (812/2025) - Prison overcrowding

Justice & Human Rights
AI summary generated by gpt-5.5

The Minister of Justice and National Integration stated that a Cabinet Memorandum to establish a consultative mechanism to regularize sentencing was submitted on 14 May 2025 and approved on 2 June 2025, with the Committee first meeting on 18 July 2025. He listed the Committee’s members, including representatives from the judiciary, Parliament, Attorney-General’s Department, academia, police, medical services, and the Ministry. He said the Committee is still functioning and has not yet submitted recommendations, so related follow-up matters do not arise.

Verbatim record (translated)

Machine-translated from Sinhala / Tamil / English

¶ 01 Hon. Speaker, the answer is as follows:

¶ 02 (a)(i) A Cabinet Memorandum was submitted on 14.05.2025 to establish a mechanism, through a consultative process, to regularize sentencing, and Cabinet approval was granted on 02.06.2025. The Committee first met on 18.07.2025.

¶ 03 (ii) Members: - Hon. Justice S. Thurairaja, PC, Judge of the Supreme Court - Hon. Dr. Kaushalya Ariyarathna, Attorney-at-Law and Member of Parliament - Mr. U. M. Pulle, President’s Counsel, Additional Solicitor General, Attorney-General’s Department - Prof. Wasantha Subasinghe, Social Scientist, University of Kelaniya - Mr. Asanka Karawita, Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police, Sri Lanka Police - Dr. Chittabharie Abeynayake, Consultant Judicial Medical Officer, National Hospital - Mr. Nishan Dhanasinghe, Additional Secretary (Prison Affairs and Rehabilitation), Ministry of Justice and National Integration - Ms. Piyumanthi Peiris, Additional Secretary (Legal), Ministry of Justice and National Integration - Ms. Roshini Hettige, Senior Assistant Secretary (Legal), Ministry of Justice and National Integration - Ms. G.C. Welikala, Senior Assistant Secretary (BS), Ministry of Justice and National Integration

¶ 04 (iii) The Committee is still functioning; recommendations have not yet been submitted.

¶ 05 (iv) Does not arise.

¶ 06 (b) Does not arise.

Provenance

Source
Hansard, Wednesday, 21 January 2026 ·No. 23242 ·English daily/uncorrected Hansard
Page · column
not yet extracted — page/column anchors are not in the current dataset; the source PDF is the citable location.
Permalink
/lk/speeches/2019

Cite as: The Hon. Harshana Nanayakkara, Attorney-at-Law - Minister of Justice and National Integration. 10th Parliament, Parliament of Sri Lanka. Hansard, 21 January 2026. No. 23242. Politick, https://staging.politick.io/lk/speeches/2019