Senior members of Sri Lankan government and military Tamil political and cultural leaders The burning of the Jaffna Public Library (Tamil: யாழ் பொது நூலகம் எரிப்பு, Yāḻ potu nūlakam erippu; Sinhala: යාපනය මහජන පුස්තකාලය ගිනිබත් කිරීම, Yāpanaya mahajana pustakālaya ginibat kirīma) by an organized mob of Sinhalese individuals took place on the night of June 1, 1981.

The library also became a repository of archival material written in palm leaf manuscripts, original copies of regionally important historic documents in the contested political history of Sri Lanka and newspapers that were published hundreds of years ago in the Jaffna peninsula.

[7][8] On Sunday, May 31, 1981, the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF), a regionally popular democratic party, held a rally in which two policemen Sergeant Punchi Banda and constable Kanagasuntharam were shot and killed by PLOTE gunmen.

[10] On the night of June 1, according to many eyewitnesses, police and government-sponsored paramilitias set fire to the Jaffna public library and destroyed it completely.

[8] Among the destroyed items were scrolls of historical value and the works and manuscripts of philosopher, artist and author Ananda Coomaraswamy and prominent intellectual Prof. Dr. Isaac Thambiah.

The destroyed articles included memoirs and works of writers and dramatists who made a significant contribution toward the sustenance of the Tamil culture, and those of locally reputed physicians and politicians.

[10] The Movement for Inter-Racial Justice and Equality (MIRJE) who sent an investigative team to Jaffna after the riot concluded: "After careful inquiries there is no doubt that the attacks and the arson were the work of some 100-175 police personnel.

[15] After 20 years the government-owned Daily News newspaper, in an editorial in 2001, termed the 1981 event an act by "goon squads let loose by the then government".

[17] In 2006 the president of Sri Lanka Mahinda Rajapakse was quoted as saying, The UNP is responsible for mass-scale riots and massacres against the Tamils in 1983, vote-rigging in the Northern Development Council elections and [the] burning of the Jaffna libraryHe was also further quoted as saying in reference to a prominent local Tamil poet, reminding the audience that Burning the Library sacred to the people of Jaffna was similar to shooting down Lord BuddhaHe concluded in that speech that as a cumulative effect of all these atrocities, the peaceful voice of the Tamils is now drowned in the echo of the gun; referring to the rebel LTTE's militancy.

[21] In 2016, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe as the leader of the United National Party apologized for the burning of the library which happened during a UNP government.

By the time President Maithripala Sirisena celebrates his second anniversary of assuming office, we will have completed a massive amount of development work in the North.

The military forces were stationed in the Jaffna Fort and the rebels positioned themselves inside the library creating a no man's land as the fighting intensified.

In 1985, after an attack on a nearby police station by Tamil rebels, soldiers entered the partially restored building and set off bombs that shredded thousands of books yet again.