Chief Justice of Sri Lanka
Presiding officer of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka
The chief justice of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is the head of the judiciary of Sri Lanka and the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. Established in 1801, the chief justice is one of ten Supreme Court justices; the other nine are the puisne justices of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. The post was created in 1801. The chief justice is nominated by the Constitutional Council, and appointed by the president. The first chief justice was Codrington Edmund Carrington. The current and 49th chief justice is Padman Surasena.
History
The office of chief justice traces its origins back with the founding the Royal Charter of Justice of 1801 (now this provision is as set out in the Constitution of Sri Lanka) by the United Kingdom. With the establishment of the Supreme Court, it was to consist of one principal judge who shall be called "The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature in the Island of Ceylon" and one other judge, who was to be called "The Puisne Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature in the Island of Ceylon". The charter required the chief justice and puisne justice to have not less than five years of experience as barristers, in England or Ireland to be named and appointed.
The post was first held by Codrington Edmund Carrington.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Chief Justice of Sri Lanka” is presiding officer of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Chief, Justice and Lanka, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “presiding officer of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5096802. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1801.
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This entry incorporates text from “Chief Justice of Sri Lanka” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.