The Women's suffrage in Sri Lanka has a protracted history comparably with such of Britain and America. In the Past, The women in Sri Lanka had the right of doing every legal procedures deserved by the law through which every facet of governing bodies burgeoned. For example, there were Parumakas[1](suburban male-chieftains) and Parumakalus(suburban women-chieftains) in pre-history which lubricated the integration of power into a one king's hand later(Mahasammatha). But in latter days too, there were figures who threaped to have the rights of humans conserved in Ceylon. Though many unfortunately did talk for men's rights and minority of them talked for women, The 20th century became a blooming-boom for the movement to revitalize the human suffrage of men and mostly of neglected women.
Agnes De Silva was one of the leading feminist figures in the women's suffrage movement who talked against the racial imparities in Ceylon which deterred women of utilizing their enfranchisement rights. De Silva acted as the Secretary of Ceylon Franchise Union which was established in 1927. She pursued activism to get franchise rights for women and to lead an organized delegation of women members of the Franchise Union to present their case at the 1928 Donoughmare Commission on Constitutional Reform which the then British Government had constituted. The reforms she introduced later became a part of new constitution established in 1931. After the new constitution came into force the adult franchise was extended to women above the age of 21, to vote irrespective of their educational status.[2]
The subsection 12.(1) of the Sri Lankan constitution guarantees equality before the law and equal protection of the law to all citizens. Subsection 12.(2) further states that "no citizen shall be discriminated against on the grounds of race, religion, language, caste, sex, political opinion [or] place of birth ..." (Cooray Sept. 1989, 12[3]).
References
- ^ NICHOLAS, C. W. (1952). "Texts of the Brāhmī Inscriptions in the Ruhuṇa National Park". The Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland. 2 (2): 126–140. ISSN 0304-2235. JSTOR 45377308.
- ^ Rappaport, Helen (2001). Encyclopedia of Women Social Reformers. ABC-CLIO. ISBN 978-1-57607-101-4.
- ^ Simmonds, K. R. (January 1974). "Constitutions of the Countries of the World. Edited and annotated by Gisbert H. Flanz and Albert P. Blaustein. [Dobbs Ferry, New York: Oceana Publications Inc.1971. Sectional Pagination in loose-leaf binder. $69.00 net per volume.]". International and Comparative Law Quarterly. 23 (1): 208–209. doi:10.1093/iclqaj/23.1.208-a. ISSN 0020-5893.