Swept into political office in 1994, thereby ending 17 years of rule by the rightwing United National Party, a year later Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga was occupying the highest political post in Sri Lanka. Thirteen years later, despite having been out of the limelight for much of that time, she is still a force to reckon with, referred to by many in Sri Lanka as the Queen. In recent months, Kumaratunga's name suddenly gained significant prominence in the media – particularly during a high-profile trip to New Delhi during the second week of September – as speculation mounted regarding a stepped-up alignment with the opposition in Colombo.
Regardless of criticism over her governance style, there is no disputing Kumaratunga's charisma and political dexterity. It is these traits, combined with an indomitable spirit, that propelled her from the political margins to provincial chief minister, then prime minister, and finally to become Sri Lanka's first female president – all of this achieved within just two years. It was also this drive that finally gave the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), led by Kumaratunga, the energy it needed to end a decade and a half in the opposition. While there are divergent opinions about Kumaratunga's 11 years at the helm, today she baldly quotes Frank Sinatra: "I did it my way."
Born to one of Sri Lanka's most prominent political families, as second daughter to two prime ministers, her father, S W R D Bandaranaike, called her his "political child". Upon her father's assassination in 1959, her mother, Sirimavo Bandaranaike, became the world's first female prime minister. Politics clearly ran through the veins of the children. Kumaratunga's brother, Anura Bandaranaike, is a former Speaker of the Parliament, and the current Minister of National Heritage in the cabinet of President Mahinda Rajapakse. Not that the family spoke in one political voice. Educated at the Sorbonne, the French-speaking, well-heeled, socialist-souled Chandrika eventually joined protest marches against her own mother, during the latter's early years as prime minister.
Chandrika later married a popular film star, Vijaya Kumaratunga, and quickly became the force behind him when he formed the Sri Lanka Mahajana Party (SLMP), originally a breakaway faction of the SLFP. Vijaya Kumaratunga's 1989 assassination, during the height of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) insurgency, drove Kumaratunga to seek refuge in England, where she remained until she became the SLFP's unanimous choice to run for office. In 1994, Kumaratunga returned, reluctantly, fearing for her young children's safety. The rest is history. Or it was: today, Chandrika Kumaratunga might be ready to step back into active politics.