Malinda Channa Pieris Seneviratne (born September 23, 1965[1]) is a Sri Lankan poet, critic, journalist, translator, political commentator, and activist.

[2] His poetry collections and translations of Sinhala texts have also been widely read and acclaimed, and have been frequently shortlisted for the prestigious Gratiaen Award.

[9] That year he sat for his A Levels, where he offered Mathematics and obtained results that were probably adequate to secure placement in one of the Science Faculties in the university system.

After several short-term jobs, including a teaching post in the ELTU, Medical Faculty, Peradeniya University in 1992, he was hired as an Editor at the Agrarian Research and Training Institute in March 1993 before leaving it the following year.

[11] Malinda's early initiation into politics and Marxism was through his father, who had been a Trotskyite as an undergraduate, and the newspaper of the Revolutionary Communist League at the University of Peradeniya, Kamkaru Mawatha (“The Path of Labour”).

[14] An even more significant political association with the then newly formed Ratavesi Peramuna, the precursor to the Sinhala Nationalist Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU),[15] would follow his return from Harvard, having falling under the influence of two ideologues he'd known through University: Patali Champika Ranawaka and Athuraliye Rathana Thera.

In 1992, an exhibition displaying LTTE, IPKF, and JVP human rights abuses in Matara was attacked by thugs connected to the UNP, which compelled a meeting in Wadduwa[16] to discuss what the party members could do next.

[19] After completing his higher education, though only partially, at Cornell University, Malinda continued his association with Ranawaka and Rathana following their formation of the Sihala Urumaya (SU),[20] the next avatar of the Janatha Mithuro.

His association with NMAT ended about a year later when the propaganda work had helped realise the intended outcome: a national effort to rid the country of the terrorist menace.

A firm believer in citizenship unhindered by racial or religious prejudices, he nevertheless remains a staunch opponent of Tamil separatism,[27] which has earned him the ire of those who advocate federalism and devolution.

[30] He has on several occasions expressed his views on federalism and devolution at various forums, and even submitted certain proposals and recommendations to the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission in 2011, where he noted with respect to separatist propaganda that “A pandering to political realities based on constructed mythologies can tide a country over in the short term but necessarily generate further rupture down the line” and added that “In the absence of a robust case for devolution, minority grievances must necessarily defer to the notion of citizenship.”[31] In October 2000, after his return from Cornell University and prior to his engagement with the Sihala Urumaya, Malinda was hired as an “understudy” to the then Editor of the Sunday Island, Manik de Silva.

[32] After a tussle with some disagreeable journalists attached to its Sinhala paper, the Divaina (to which he contributed as well), he left the Island in 2004 and did part-time work as a Copywriter at Phoenix Advertising via an invitation from its Chairman, Irvin Weerackody.

In 2006 he was hired as the Deputy Features Editor and Editorial Writer at The Nation upon an invitation by the founder CEO of Rivira Media Corporation (which owned the paper), Krishantha Cooray.

[36] Not surprisingly, therefore, his editorship at The Nation became his best few years by his own confession,[37] until 2015 when, thanks to a tussle with the management over their acceptance of a previously sent, and by default invalid, letter of resignation, he vacated his post citing constructive termination.