-By LeN Political Correspondent
(Lanka-e-News -04.June.2025, 11.40 PM) For years, the narrative surrounding the 2019 Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka has been tightly controlled, diplomatically deflected, and politically sanitised. But now, five years later, an unexpected voice has emerged to challenge the status quo—a voice not from the political wilderness, but from the very nerve centre of Sri Lanka’s security establishment.
Asanga Abeygunasekara, former Director General of the Institute of National Security Studies (INSS), has broken his silence following his controversial detention at Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA) earlier this year. His version of events, however, is not one the Indian government—or certain sections of Sri Lanka’s security and intelligence community—are likely to appreciate.
Speaking to VT in an exclusive and detailed disclosure, Abeygunasekara claims that his detention was “orchestrated by Indian intelligence authorities”, not over any legal matter, but as retribution for statements he made to the Presidential Commission investigating the Easter Sunday attacks.
According to Abeygunasekara, it all began with Room 919 of the Shangri-La Hotel, Colombo—a room that would soon be engulfed in fire and blood on the morning of 21st April 2019.
“In my deposition to the Presidential Commission, I revealed that I and my family were staying at the Shangri-La on the day of the attack,” he says. “What shocked me most is what happened a few weeks after the blast.”
Abeygunasekara claims he was approached by Lt. Col. Ravi Mishra, then the Defence Attaché at the Indian High Commission in Colombo. “He told me, quite pointedly, that they had known I was in Room 919. He said, ‘If we had known you were there with your family, we would have told you.’”
The implication, Abeygunasekara says, was clear: they knew something, and chose not to share it.
When Abeygunasekara returned to Sri Lanka in early 2024 for his mother’s funeral, he says he was immediately detained at BIA under murky and unexplained circumstances. No formal charges. No arrest warrant. Just silence.
“It was psychological warfare,” he says. “They didn’t want to arrest me legally. They wanted to scare me. Humiliate me. Make an example.”
And he has no doubt who was behind it.
“I’m certain this was done at the request of Indian intelligence,” Abeygunasekara alleges. “They knew I had testified before the Commission. They knew what I said about Lt. Col. Mishra. And they wanted to send a message—Don’t speak out.”
In what may be the most explosive portion of his testimony, Obeysekara recounts details of an alleged intelligence dialogue held on 4th April 2019, just weeks before the bombings. Present at the event, he claims, were top officials from RAW, India’s external intelligence agency, including then-Colombo Station Head Manohar Ganesh, alongside senior Sri Lankan officials.
“The subject was counter-terrorism,” he says. “But no one—absolutely no one—raised any red flags about an imminent attack. If they had, the entire operation could have been stopped in its tracks.”
Abeygunasekara contends that Indian intelligence had critical information as early as mid-April, obtained from the detention of individuals smuggling detonators—information which, he says, was only passed to Sri Lanka at the very last minute.
According to him, Lt. Col. Mishra reportedly shared a final warning with then SIS Director Nilantha Jayawardhana on the morning of the attack, when it was already too late.
“What’s the point of telling us after the bombs have gone off?” he asks bitterly.
In another stunning claim, Abeygunasekara alleges that RAW’s Colombo Station Chief at the time, Manohar Ganesh, directly threatened him not to disclose any information related to India’s prior knowledge of the attacks—neither to the media nor to any local investigative body.
“He warned me clearly: ‘Do not speak about this to anyone—not even in a closed-door inquiry,’” Abeygunasekara claims.
This warning, he says, turned into a campaign of intimidation that followed him long after he stepped down from INSS.
“I received veiled threats,” he says. “Colleagues were told to distance themselves. I was blackballed in security circles.”
Abeygunasekara’s narrative paints a troubling picture of Indian foreknowledge and selective disclosure.
“If India knew about the detonators, if they had been tracking jihadist elements in Sri Lanka, and if they had pinpointed a potential date—19th April 2019, as Mishra allegedly suggested—why was this information not passed through the proper channels in time?”
It’s a question that haunts not just Abeygunasekara but the families of the 269 victims, including dozens of children, who perished in the blasts.
He goes a step further.
“It’s becoming increasingly clear that someone involved in organising the attack may have had contact with Indian authorities, or Indian authorities had access to someone on the inside.”
Abeygunasekara’s revelations open another can of worms: the culture of intimidation and secrecy that permeates Sri Lanka’s security architecture.
“People are afraid,” he says. “They know who holds the strings—whether it’s in Colombo or in New Delhi.”
Several former officials who spoke off-record to VT corroborated that Indian defence officials routinely bypass Sri Lanka’s institutional channels, choosing instead to operate through informal relationships and personal networks.
“Sometimes, they talk to individuals, not institutions,” says one retired intelligence officer. “That’s how plausible deniability works.”
In a moment of reflection, Abeygunasekara says the part that disturbs him most is that if the information had reached him, he would have called for immediate lockdowns of churches, tightened surveillance, and possibly saved hundreds of lives.
“That’s what keeps me up at night. That if I had known, I could have stopped it.”
Despite the damning claims, no official from the Indian government has ever been summoned or questioned by Sri Lanka’s legal apparatus regarding the Easter Sunday bombings. Nor has RAW’s role been publicly scrutinised in the five separate investigations conducted thus far.
“It’s all very polite,” Abeygunasekara scoffs. “Everyone’s more worried about offending a neighbour than finding the truth.”
VT has reviewed Abeygunasekara’s sworn testimony to the Presidential Commission of Inquiry, which was surprisingly redacted in parts and never cited in the final report. His references to Lt. Col. Mishra, RAW presence at the Hindu-SL dialogue, and the Room 919 revelation were all excluded.
“It’s no accident,” he says. “They didn’t want to name names.”
To some, Abeygunasekara is a whistleblower. To others, a pariah. Either way, his allegations demand attention.
“If we’re not even allowed to ask these questions,” he concludes, “then we’ve already lost—not just lives, but the truth itself.”
As international observers push for a UN-backed inquiry and mounting pressure grows from victim families and church leaders, the question looms large: Is Sri Lanka willing to challenge India?
Or will Abeygunasekara's warnings, like the ones he never received, come far too late?
-By LeN Political Correspondent
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by (2025-06-04 20:41:12)
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