S. de Silva Jayasinghe

Nanayakkara Atulugamage Stephen de Silva Jayasinghe OBE (6 January 1911 - 1977) was a Ceylonese politician.^[1]

At the 2nd parliamentary elections held between 24 May 1952 and 30 May 1952 he successfully contested the seat of Wellawatte-Galkissa on behalf of the United National Party. He polled 13,388 (57.5% of the total vote) and 4,500 votes clear of his nearest rival, Colvin R. de Silva, the sitting member and Lanka Sama Samaja Party nominee.^[2] He ran for re-election at the 3rd parliamentary elections held between 5 April 1956 and 10 April 1956, but was defeated by de Silva, who received 16,782 votes to Jayasinghe’s 11,806 votes.^[3]

At the 4th parliamentary elections, held in March 1960, the seat of Wellawatte-Galkissa was replaced by the Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia electorate. The newly created seat was contested by Jayasinghe and de Silva, with Jayasinghe winning by 4,372 votes.^[4] However as the election left neither of the country's two major parties with a majority, another election was called. At the subsequent elections held in July that year Jayasinghe was defeated by de Silva by 1,110 votes.^[5]

At the next parliamentary elections, held on 22 March 1965, Jayasinghe re-contested the seat of Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia, this time successfully defeating de Silva by 3,289 votes.^[6]

He was unable to retain the seat at the 1970 parliamentary elections, where he was beaten by the Lanka Sama Samaja candidate, Vivienne Goonewardena, 29,430 votes to 27,463 votes.^[7] His long-term political rival, de Silva, having been elected to the seat of Agalawatte in a 1967 by-election.

In July 1977 he regained the Dehilawa-Mount Lavinia seat at the 8th parliamentary elections, polling 18,279 votes (62.75% of the total vote).^[8] Jayasinghe died a few months after he was elected and at the subsequent by-election his daughter, Sunethra, was elected to replace him.^[9]

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