Estern Province

Estern Province Flag 

The Eastern Province is one of the nine provinces of Sri Lanka, the first level administrative division of the country. The provinces have existed since the 19^th century but did not have any legal status until 1987 when the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka established provincial councils. Between 1988 and 2006 the province was temporarily merged with the Northern Province to form the North Eastern Province. The capital of the province is Trincomalee.

In 1815 the British gained control of the entire island of Ceylon. They divided the island into three ethnic based administrative structures: Low Country Sinhalese, Kandyan Sinhalese and Tamil. The Eastern Province was part of the Tamil administration. In 1833, in accordance with the recommendations of the Colebrooke-Cameron Commission, the ethnic based administrative structures were unified into a single administration divided into five geographic provinces . The districts of Batticaloa, Bintenna (part of present day Badulla District), Tamankaduva (present day Polonnaruwa ) and Trincomalee formed the new Eastern Province. Tamankaduva was transferred to the newly created North Central Provincein 1873 and Bintenna was transferred to the newly created Uva Province in 1886.

The Indo-Lanka Accord signed on 29^th July 1987 required the Sri Lankan government to devolve powers to the provinces and, in the interim, to merge the Northern and Eastern provinces into one administrative unit The accord required a referendum to be held by 31^th December 1988 in the Eastern Province to decide whether the merger should be permanent. Crucially, the accord allowed the Sri Lankan president to postpone the referendum at his discretion. On 14^th November 1987 the Sri Lankan Parliament passed the 13th Amendment to the 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka and the Provincial Councils Act No 42 of 1987, establishing provincial councils. On September 2^th and 8^th 1988 President Jayewardene issued proclamations enabling the Northern and Eastern provinces to be one administrative unit administered by one elected Council. The North-East Province was born.

The proclamations were only meant to be a temporary measure until a referendum was held in the Eastern Province on a permanent merger between the two provinces. However, the referendum was never held and successive Sri Lankan presidents issued proclamations annually extending the life of the "temporary" entity.The merger was bitterly opposed by Sri Lankan nationalists. The combined North-East Province occupied one fourth of Sri Lanka. The thought of the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam controlling this province, directly or indirectly, alarmed them greatly. On 14 ^th July 2006, after a long campaign against the merger, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna political party filed three separate petitions with the Supreme Court requesting a separate provincial council for the East. On 16^th October 2006 the Supreme Court ruled that the proclamations issued by President Jayewardene were null and void and had no legal effect. The North-East Province was formally de-merged into the Northern and Eastern provincse on 1^st January 2007.

Much of the Eastern Province was under the control of rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam for many years during the civil war. The entire province was recaptured by the Sri Lankan militaryin 2007. After coming under Government control communities in the Eastern Province suffered from insecurity in the form of illegal taxes, political killings, abductions. Many community members blamed ProGovernment Tamil groups such as the Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP).[13] In 2008 due to the indiscriminate firearm use by various Tamil factions government planned to disarm Tamil Paramilitary groups. However the TMVP kept arms due to threat of LTTE and denied they were active in Civilian are as. TMVP was finally disarmed in 2009 after the LTTE was defeated.

The province is surrounded by the Northern Province to the north, the Bay of Bengal to the east, the Southern Province to the south, and the Uva, Central and North Central provinces to the west. The province's coast is dominated by lagoons, the largest being Batticaloa Lagoon, Kokkilai lagoon, Upaar LagoonandUllackalie Lagoon.

Administrative units

The Eastern Province is divided into 3 administrative districts, 45 Divisional Secretary's Divisions (DS Divisions) and 1,085 Grama Niladhari Divisions (GN Divisions).

Districts

Ampara District	-    Ampara
Batticaloa District	-    Batticaloa
Trincomalee District	-    Trincomalee

External links

Eastern Provincial Council

If you interest to know more about the other district in Sri Lanka followed Navigation to it

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