In 1956, Solomon Bandaranaike led a coalition of leftist parties to a landslide victory in the 1956 general election on a Sinhala nationalist platform and was appointed the third Prime Minister of Ceylon.

The act immediately triggered discontent among the Tamils, who perceived their language, culture, and economic position as being subject to an increasing threat.

[2] Eventually Bandaranaike entered into negotiations with them and the Federal party and agreed to the Bandaranaike-Chelvanayakam Pact of 1957, which would have made Tamil the administrative language in the Tamil-speaking north and east regions.

But he was forced to cancel the pact under pressure from Sinhala nationalists and some Buddhist monks, particularly the United National Party, which organised a 'March on Kandy', led by J. R.

This led to a wave of reprisal tarrings of Tamil offices, shops, houses, and even people in the south by Sinhalese gangs as part of a pro-Sri campaign.

Minister of Justice M. W. H. de Silva, citing police reports, recounted that in Bogawantalawa on April 2, Indian Tamil campaigners had stoned a bus.

[15] Vavuniya MP C. Suntharalingam recounted that around the same time, 300 Sinhalese laborers of the Land Development and Irrigation Department armed themselves with blades and proceeded to the Tamil village Cheddikulam in trucks.

[16] Meanwhile, 400 Tamil laborers were laid off when the Royal Navy Dockyard in Trincomalee was closed and transferred to the Government of Ceylon following the request by Prime Minister Bandaranaike in 1956.

[19] Leslie Goonewardene, MP for Panadura, accused the members of the Executive Committee of Bandaranaike's SLFP of having attended anti-Tamil boycott meetings where people were also called upon to drive out the Tamils, and blamed the government's pandering to its Sinhalese racialist base for enabling the riots to break out.

[23] On May 21, C. Rajadurai, MP for Batticaloa, received information that preparations were being undertaken by Sinhalese conspirators to attack the Tamils travelling by train through Polonnaruwa to the Federal Party convention in Vavuniya (due to be held on the 23rd, 24th and 25th of May).

A large armed crowd of Sinhala labourers (around 500) from the Land Development and Irrigation departments had gathered at Polonnaruwa ready to attack the Tamils.

[28] However, this is disputed by historian James Manor who suggests that the perpetrators were more likely to be Tamils retaliating for the earlier attack in Polonnaruwa given that the derailment took place in a Tamil-majority area where anti-Sinhalese violence was rising.

That night, D. A. Seneviratne, former mayor of Nuwara Eliya, was shot in his car at Eravur while he was on his way to his estate in Kalkudah, though this was later alleged by some politicians to have been for personal reasons rather than racial ones.

As they came out screaming, men, women and children were cut down with home-made swords, grass-cutting knives and katties (a type of cutter), or pulped under heavy clubs.

At 10 a.m. that morning, following the spread of news of the murders of Police Sergeant Appuhamy and D. A. Seneviratne, Sinhalese gangs began beating Tamils in Colombo and several of its suburbs.

[40] Widespread rioting along the coast from Colombo to Matara was mainly triggered by the return of Sinhalese fishermen who had been chased to the ocean by Tamil rioters in the Eastern Province.

Kotelawala claimed that every Tamil person in Badulla town would have been killed if things had gone according to “Operation Kekira”, a plan premeditated by Sinhalese conspirators.

Sinhalese laborers of the Land Development and Irrigation Department from Padaviya formed a mob armed with firearms, hand bombs, knives, and other weapons.

[45] 56 cases of arson and attacks were registered in the Batticaloa District, and 11 murders were recorded, but it is believed that the actual number of Sinhalese killed in Karativu alone is far larger than the official statistic.

[46] Many Sinhalese had managed to flee by water and land on the southern coast, but others had fled into the jungle, where they had succumbed to hunger and wild animals.

[48] Prime Minister Bandaranaike initially avoided taking decisive action and it took four days after the riots had begun for a state of emergency to be imposed.

[50] As violence was Spreading island-wide, a delegation of members of parliament and leading citizens met with Prime Minister Bandaranaike, urging him to declare a state of emergency and bring the situation under control.

Thereafter, Sir Oliver Goonetilleke, Governor General of Ceylon called on the Prime Minister at his private residence, urging him to act immediately.

Following formal request by the Prime Minister and his cabinet, Governor General declared a state of emergency under the articles of the Public Security Ordinance at noon on the 27 May.

Exercising his reserve powers under a state of emergency ordered the full deployment of the Ceylon Armed Forces to assist the police in suppressing the violence and restoring peace.

[51] Police patrols supported by Army detachments engaged gangs of rioters in Anuradhapura and Padaviya areas who has been armed with shotguns, rifles, homemade bombs and molotov cocktails led by World War II veterans.

The army was eventually withdrawn from civilian areas in the rest of the country, but remained present in Jaffna for 25 years as part of the existing "Operation Monty", later expanded to Task Force Anti Illicit Immigration.

[52] The Governor General also imposed restrictions on press freedom and warned reporters of the consequences of defying his orders by invoking the Detention Laws under the Emergency Regulations.

[citation needed] Bandaranaike showed partiality to the Sinhalese community by visiting the Thurstan Road camp housing Sinhalese evacuees from Jaffna but not the nearby Royal College camp housing Tamils;[55] and by, according to Dr. N. M. Perera, allowing the Buddhist monk Mapitigama Buddharakkitha, a member of the Bandaranaike government and a leader of the Eksath Bhikkhu Peramuna which had been agitating for Sinhala Only Act, to broadcast his "incitement" speech over the radio.

[3] Prime Minister Bandaranaike was assassinated the following year by a Buddhist monk, leading to months of political instability from which his party reemerged to form a stable government under his widow Sirimavo in 1960.