“A college is not raised by land or by law. It is raised by the people who decide, one appointment at a time, that it deserves to exist — and by those who keep deciding it, year after year.”
Every founding has faces behind it
The full story of how Ranabima Royal College came to be — the land, the timeline, the milestones — is told on the College’s Overview and Heritage pages. This page exists for a narrower purpose: to name and thank the people themselves.
The Founders
Ranabima Royal College exists because of the shared resolve of two Central Province officials who believed rural students deserved an education equal to any in the country.
W. M. P. B. Dissanayake
As the province’s Chief Minister, Dissanayake lent his office and authority to the project, co-founding an institution built to serve rural Central Province and to stand as a model of provincial education for the country.
Palitha Elkaduwa
The idea for the college originated with Elkaduwa, who devoted years of effort to making it real. His stated purpose: quality education for rural students, and deeper understanding between the province’s communities.
The First Academic Staff
Before a single lesson was taught, the college’s opening staff had to be found — and every one of them earned their post the same way its students would.
Ranabima Royal College’s first academic staff numbered sixteen, each selected through a formal qualifying examination rather than appointment — setting the same merit-first standard the college would go on to apply to its students.
Leading them was S. M. Keerthirathne, the college’s founding Principal, tasked with building an academic culture from nothing on a campus that had opened its gates only months earlier.
Nine Principals, Three Decades
From the college's opening in 1996 to the present day, nine principals have led Ranabima Royal College — each entrusted, in turn, with carrying the founders' purpose forward.
"To the two who founded it, the sixteen who first staffed it, and every principal who has led it since — Ranabima Royal College stands because you decided it should."In tribute — Ranabima Royal College, founded 2 March 1996