
W Dahanayaka
Wijeyananda Dahanayaka
Popularly as W. Dahanayaka
Born on 22 October 1902
Died on 4 May 1997 was a Sri Lankan politician. He was the Prime Minister of Ceylon from September 1959 to March 1960.
Dahanayake became active in pre-independence politics while serving as a teacher and switched to full-time politics. As a member of the Trotskyite Lanka Sama Samaja Party, he was elected to the Galle Municipal Council from the Kumbalwella Ward, which he held until 1944. He was elected the first Mayor of Galle in 1939 and served till 1941. When World War II started in the far-east, the Lanka Sama Samaja Party refused to support the British war effort. Dahanayake was prosecuted by the police for organizing a strike during the height of war, which angered the British colonial administration. He represented himself in court without a lawyer and won against the crown prosecution.