Investigations into the killing of a woman doctor in Hambantota snowballed into a major crisis, with the GMOA threatening strong trade union action over remarks attributed to a senior policeman and a cabinet minister in connection with the incident.
GMOA president Dr. Upul Gunasekera told The Sunday Times that the comments made by Minister and Government Defence spokesman Keheliya Rambukwella and Tangalle Division Senior Police Superintendent Neil Daluwatte to the media, undermined the gravity of the incident.
He said while minister Rambukwella compared doctors to bus conductors who threatened to strike over anything and everything, the SSP had tried to portray the suspect as a decorated army commando. He said that the GMOA was treating this issue seriously and had even sought a meeting with President Mahinda Rajapaksa.
Dr. Gunasekera also hit out at the police charging that they had been lethargic in apprehending the suspect and that it was the intervention of the military police that finally led to his arrest. However, when The Sunday Times contacted SSP Daluwatte in this regard, he insisted that the suspect was apprehended in a sting operation carried out by the Tangalle police, with the cooperation of a close army associate of the suspect, barely 48 hours after the incident was reported to police.
Tangalle police who are conducting investigations under the direction of SSP Daluwatte say that the suspect served in the battlefront and was immensely popular among his fellow villagers.
A grudge killing?
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| W.D. Lakshmi Indunil |
The 33-year-old doctor identified as W.D. Lakshmi Indunil was shot dead, shortly after dusk on Monday, while she was attending to patients at a government-run dispensary in the tiny village of Bandagiriya in the Hambantota district.
According to police, the suspect had been enraged over some embarrassing remarks the doctor had made earlier in the day when he had visited the dispensary seeking treatment for his wife who had suffered a cut on her hand. The doctor had apparently been cheered on by a staff attendant who had been present.
Investigations have also revealed that the suspect and the doctor had been embroiled in a dispute last year where the suspect is alleged to have used abusive language at the doctor when she had delayed treating him for a chronic stomach ailment.
The doctor had instituted legal action against the suspect over the incident and the case was pending at the time of the slaying. | 
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