A long term journalist and the former Chief Editor of Saturday Review, the only English language weekly newspaper published in Jaffna, A.J. Kanagarathna, 74, passed away in Colombo on Wednesday morning.

He was a pioneer journalist in the Peninsula and a writer of English who had also served at the University of Jaffna as an English lecturer for more than 18 years from the beginning of the university until his retirement at 60 years.

He was born in Kayts, grew up in Jaffna town and went to Colombo recently for medical treatment.

His body is being kept at the Raymond's Florists at Boralla in Colombo and will be buried on Thursday in Kanatte Cemetery in Colombo, family sources said.

He represented nearly every literary group in Jaffna, and wrote on many topics including literature and cinema, and translated many Tamil novels in English.

People of Jaffna remembered him as a noble intellectual and his colleagues as a creative man.

Source: TamilNet
Date: 13 October 2006