The district was named after the town of Ampara in Ampara District, Eastern Province.
The 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka introduced the proportional representation electoral system for electing members of Parliament.
The existing 160 mainly single-member electoral districts were replaced with 22 multi-member electoral districts.
[1] Ampara electoral district was replaced by the Ampara (Amparai) multi-member electoral district at the 1989 general elections, the first under the PR system, though Ampara continues to be a polling division of the multi-member electoral district.
Key Independent SLFP UNP Results of the 4th parliamentary election held on 19 March 1960:[2] Results of the 5th parliamentary election held on 20 July 1960:[4] Results of the 6th parliamentary election held on 22 March 1965:[5] Results of the 7th parliamentary election held on 27 May 1970:[6] Results of the 8th parliamentary election held on 21 July 1977:[7]