Gotabaya: Untold achievements

GOTABAYA Rajapaksa, former President of Sri Lanka, son of D.A. Rajapaksa, was born in June 1949, Palatuwa in Matara district as the fifth of nine siblings.

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He was brought up in Weeraketiya in Hambantota district. Hailing from a well-known political family, his father a prominent politician, Member of Parliament and the Cabinet Minister of Agriculture and Land in Wijayananda Dahanayake government and Mahinda Rajapaksa his elder brother. He was educated at Ananda College, Colombo and joined the Sri Lankan Army.

Gotabaya's army career

Gotabaya joined the Sri Lanka Army as a cadet officer on 26 April 1971, in the middle of the 1971 JVP insurrection. Following basic officer training at Army Training Centre, Dityatalawa, he was commissioned as a signals officer and transferred to several infantry regiments. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in May 1972, in Sri Lanka Signals Corps. He was sent to a young officers course at the Military College of Signals, Rawalpindi. On his return, he was assigned as signals officer to Task Force Anti Illicit Immigration, based at Palaly, under the command of Colonel Tissa Weeratunga. In April 1974, he was promoted to Lieutenant and in October transferred to Sri Lanka Singha Regiment as an infantry officer.

In April 1975, he attended an infantry officers course at School of Infantry and Tactics, Rawalandi, Pakistan. Returning in June, he was assigned as battalion intelligence officer at Echelon Barracks in Colombo and promoted to Captain in April 1977. Following the change of government in the 1977 general election, he was transferred to the Army Training Centre, Diyatalawa as an officer instructor.