Henry Alfred Ian Goonetilleke (known as H. A. I. Goonetileke) was a director of the University of Peradeniya library, the first chairman of the Gratiaen Trust and an eminent scholar in Sri Lanka.
He received his FLA in 1966 obtaining a distinction for his dissertation entitled A Bibliography of Ceylon - A Systematic Guide to the Literature on the land, people, history and culture published in Western languages from the 16th Century to the present day.
He created history by holding three different designations in the same university[4] as, In 1982, he joined the re-building process of the destroyed National Library of Jaffna.
[5] On 5 January 1997, on his 75th birthday, he formally donated his priceless 60-year collection of books, journals, pamphlets, off prints and other documents of an academic nature, paintings and other art objects such as statues in metal and wood as well as some replicas in plaster to the University of Peradeniya library.
The Gratiaen Trust awards the H. A. I. Goonetileke Prize, named after him, for translations into English of literary works originally written in Sinhala or Tamil.