Obeyesekere Walawa

Obeyesekere Walawa aka Maligawa is a large bungalow (as mansions are referred to locally) in Colombo, Sri Lanka. A stately home modeled on Neoclassical style, it was used as a town house by the Obeyesekere family, even thou at its construction it was situated in the area of Cinnamon Gardens a suburb of Colombo, now part of greater colombo area.

Built in the 1920s with large gardens and extravagant interior firings, by the wealthy and powerful Obeyesekere family, headed by Sir James Peter Obeyesekere II, Kt, MA who was the First Mudaliyar highest post for a Ceylonese in the British Colonial Administration of Ceylon at the time.

In 1939, Sir James on request of the Royal College Colombo, granted the house with its furniture for the use of the school as a hostel after the school attempted to reestablish a hostel after absence of one for students from out station for several years. However in December 1941 with the out break of the world war 2 in the far east, the Maligawa along with the Royal College premise was taken over by the British Army. As the school was turned in to a military hospital, the Maligawa soon became a the officer's mess for the RAF that had covered the Colombo Race Course to a airfield.

Several years after the war it was returned to the Obeyesekere family, and it became the home of Deshamanya J.P. Obeyesekere III former senator and minister of health & finance; his wife Siva Obeyesekere her self a former minister of health.

External links