The Bench comprised Justices Shiranee Tilakawardane, K.Sripavan and S.I.Imam. The matter was fixed to be mentioned on November 9.

Petitioner Sulaiman Lebbe Nijam alias Sivarasa Suthan (24) is a tailor by profession. He is a father of a child and the sole breadwinner of his family.

He has cited the OIC of the Pettah Police Station, as well the CID and the CID Director, the IGP, the Director TID and the Attorney General as respondents.

B.N.Thamboo instructed by S.M.M.Samsudeen appeared for the petitioner. Senior State Counsel Shanaka Wijesinghe appeared for the Attorney General.

Sulaiman Lebbe was arrested in Puttalam by the Pettah Police on February 28, 2008 and produced before the Colombo Magistrate’s Court and remanded. He is languishing in prison for over more than 3 ˝ years. He states that while he was detained at the CID, Colombo, he was subjected to assault, harassment and degrading treatment and was threatened to confess his involvement with the LTTE. He says as he had no connections whatsoever with the LTTE and refused to accept the allegations but during his detention at the CID, he was forced to sign several statements in the Sinhala language, which were not read or explained to him in Tamil before his signatures were obtained on those documents.

He complains he was not informed of any reasons for his arrest at the time of his arrest by the Pettah Police officers and alleges the police officers had violated his fundamental right of freedom from arbitrary arrest guaranteed by the Constitution.

He is seeking the Court to order the respondents to pay him a compensation of one million rupees for the physical and mental suffering experienced by him due to his illegal arrest and prolonged detention which included torture.

Source: Daily Mirror - Sri Lanka