President Ranil Wickremesinghe has decided to grant a special state pardon to a total of 933 inmates in view of the 25th National Prisoners’ Day, commemorated on 12 September.
Accordingly, 926 male prisoners and 7 female prisoners are to be released under the special state pardon, in accordance with Article 34 of the Constitution of Sri Lanka, Prisons Media Spokesman Chandana Ekanayake confirmed.
The group of inmates were released under the following criteria:
- Those who were granted a month’s pardon for each year that has been served of their sentence
- Those serving prison time as of 12 September for not having paid their relevant fines
- Those aged over 65 and have served half, or more than half of their sentence period as of 12 September
- Those who were sentenced to 40 years of imprisonment and have served 20 years of their sentence as of 12 September
- Those were sentenced to rehabilitation over drug-related offences and have completed half or more of their relevant sentences as of 12 September
