Ajith Rupasinghe Surendra (14 February 1943 – 3 April 2017) was a Sri Lankan political activist. While he was living and studying in the United States, he was introduced to

communism Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

by his older brother Kumar Rupesinghe. He studied for a PhD in sociology at the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Francisco, ...

. Surendra supported the

Nepal Nepal (; ne, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mai ...

revolution initiated by Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre) through Nepalese Civil War and condemned when they abandoned the war to sign the Comprehensive Peace Accord in 2006 Ajith Rupesinghe returned to Sri Lanka and joined the Ceylon Communist Party (Maoist). He assumed the leadership of the party as the General Secretary after the death of N. Sanmugathasan in 1993, and remained leader until his death in 2017. He took the initiative to distinguish the party name with

Ceylon Communist Party The Communist Party of Sri Lanka ( si, ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ කොමියුනිස්ට් පක්ෂය, ''Sri Lankavay Komiyunist Pakshaya'' ta, இலங்கை கம்யூனிஸ்ட் கட்சி, trans ...

and changed from 'Ceylon Communist Party (Peking Wing)' to Ceylon Communist Party (Maoist). Under the leadership of Surendra the Ceylon Communist Party (Maoist) openly supported

Vikramabahu Karunaratne Vikramabahu Karunaratne ( si, වික්‍රමබාහු කරුණාරත්න, translit=Vikramabāhu Karuṇāratna; ta, விக்கிரமபாகு கருணாரத்தின, translit=Vikkiramapāku Karuṇāratt ...

for the

2010 Sri Lankan presidential election Presidential elections were held in Sri Lanka on 26 January 2010. The elections were announced on 23 November 2009 when incumbent President Mahinda Rajapaksa decided to seek a fresh mandate prior to the expiration of his term in 2011. Nominatio ...

. This stand was welcomed by most of the leftist parties because from 1965 the Ceylon Communist Party (Maoist) was boycotting all the elections held in Sri Lanka after N. Sanmugathasan contested in Colombo Central.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Surendra, Ajith Rupasinghe 20th-century Sri Lankan politicians Sri Lankan communists 1943 births 2017 deaths University of California alumni People from British Ceylon Maoists Anti-revisionists Communism in Sri Lanka People of the Nepalese Civil War