Presidential pardon for controversial monk overturned
Galagodaatte Gnanasara was sentenced in 2018 to six years for contempt of court and intimidating the wife of a missing cartoonist.
**Presidential pardon for controversial monk overturned**
Galagodaatte Gnanasara was a trusted ally of former president Gotabaya Rajapaksa
Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court has overturned a presidential pardon given to a hardline Buddhist monk and ordered him to serve the rest of a six-year prison term for intimidating the wife of a missing political cartoonist.
Galagodaatte Gnanasara was convicted in 2018 of contempt of court and of intimidating Sanya Eknaligoda, the wife of Prageeth Eknaligoda, who disappeared in 2010.
The monk had disrupted a court hearing to voice support for military intelligence officials who were accused of abducting the cartoonist.
Gnanasara served less than a year of the sentence because he was granted a pardon by Maithripala Sirisena, who was president at the time.
In his cartoons, Prageeth Eknaligoda highlighted media freedom, political power and social disadvantage.
His work was critical of former president Mahinda Rajapaksa, a nationalist credited with defeating Tamil separatist rebels in 2009 after a bloody civil war.
Eknaligoda disappeared in 2010 and has not been seen since. His wife has campaigned to find out what happened to him and says the authorities have not done enough to investigate his disappearance.
Gnanasara, who heads the Bodu Bala Sena (BBS), or “Buddhist Power Force,” supported Rajapaksa and his brother Gotobaya, who later also became president.
In 2025, he was handed a separate nine-month prison sentence for insulting Islam and inciting religious hatred.
Sri Lanka rarely convicts Buddhist monks, and it is almost unheard of for one to receive a custodial sentence.