Pelpita used his pen for cause of social justice -President

President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga in a condolence message on the death of former Silumina Consultant Editor and Western Provincial Council Minister Vajira Pelpita to his wife Sirima, said she was shocked and grieved to hear of Pelpita's demise.

The President said she first came to know veteran journalist, Pelpita more than four decades ago when he was a firebrand member of the progressive Left Movement.

Pelpita who began his political life from the LSSP was later an active leader of the CPSL, President Kumaratunga said she had the occasion to work closely with Pelpita when the United Socialist front contested the first Provincial Council election in 1988. The President said the manner in which Pelpita worked as a member of her Board of Ministers when she became Chief Minister of the Western Province after the Second Provincial Council election in 1993 occurs to her mind on this occasion.

Pelpita was a fearless journalist and a veteran media person. He was a pioneer in fashioning leftist newspapers in a more fighting spirit.

He was a man of learning and wide experience. A skilled orator on the political stage who kept audiences spellbound, Pelpita was a progressive writer who fearlessly used his pen for the cause of social justice till his last breath.

"Pelpita rendered a vital media service for the cause of peace against extremist communalism and we have lost him at a time we needed his services most", President Kumaratunga said.

His death was an irreparable loss to the progressive movement including progressive journalism in this country.

The President who expressed her deepest sympathies to Mrs. Pelpita, her son Chathura and daughter Tharanga added that she wished to share the grief with Pelpita's bereaved friends in the Media, Arts and Cultural fields and his fans on this sad occasion.

"May Vajira Pelpita attain Nibbana," the President said.