MR off to India

PTI: Opposition leader Mahinda Rajapaksa is set to visit India, his Office has said.

This will be Rajapaksa’s first overseas tour since being appointed as the Leader of the Opposition last month.

He will leave on 8 February on an official tour to India, his Office said.

Rajapaksa is to deliver a lecture on Sri Lanka-India relations in Bangalore, it said.

This will be his second visit to India within the past six months. In September 2018, he visited New Delhi and met Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Rajapaksa was controversially appointed the Prime Minister by President Maithripala Sirisena late October 2018, triggering an unprecedented constitutional crisis which lasted for over 50 days. The Supreme Court later restored Ranil Wickremesinghe as Prime Minister.