Madawala

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Madawala, also called Madawala Bazaar, is a village in the Central Province of Sri Lanka. This village, which consists of over 2000 families most of whom are practising Muslims. The inhabitants speak a local dialect of Tamil which differs with the Tamil due to Islamic influences. They can also speak Sinhalese, which is the national language of Sri Lanka as well as English but lesser effort is taken in learning English because they fear Western Christian traditions will interfere with their local cultures and Muslim traditions.

Madawala is famous for its Medina National School or also known as Madina Central College, is one of the leading Tamil medium schools in Sri Lanka, which is situated in this village. It has produced several renowned intellectuals, scholars, religious leaders, professors, lawyers, doctors, engineers, computer experts, sportsmen, school principals, teachers, poets, authors, traders, industrialists and soldiers of armed forces of the country. Madawala also has a famous Grand Mosque and many other Thakkiya mosques which have made the inhabitants very easy to pray at a mosque.

Madawala has come into spotlight mainly due to the negative events such as the event that took place in the year 1999 when the opposing political factions took up arms to fight against each other which was only stopped when the Government forces intervened and the more recent event in 2001 where 10 Muslim boys who supported the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress were shot dead by the Government which was Sri Lanka National Party.

Recently Ashraff Memorial Building was built in the grounds of Madawala Madina Central college in memory of M.H. Mohammad Ashraff who was the founder of Sri Lanka Muslim Congress.