By 
Leader of the NPP, Anura Kumara Dissanayaka, was among the many politicians who arrived at the funeral parlour to pay their last respects to veteran leftist leader Dr. Wickremabahu Karunaratne.
The NPP leader was quick to turn around and strike up a conversation with other NSSP comrades who had turned up to bid farewell to their dear leader.
Wickremabahu was 81 when he passed away and had been ailing for some time with pain in the abdomen. In response to a query from AKD, a comrade said that since the JVP attack on Wickremabahu, he had suffered from gunshot wounds in the abdomen and never fully recovered.
lasting impact
It was certainly a difficult moment for AKD, who is the current leader of the JVP, the party blamed for the shooting. The NSSP comrade explained how Wickremabahu had to undergo surgery and the lasting impact of the damage.
In 1987, the NSSP, led by Wickremabahu Karunarathna, joined with the LSSP, CP, and Sri Lanka Mahajana Pakshaya (SLMP) to form the United Socialist Alliance. Karunaratne was injured on 2 December 1988 when a JVP gang attacked an election rally at Kadawatte near Colombo in support of SLMP presidential candidate Ossie Abeygunasekera. The JVP attacked numerous left-wing politicians and their supporters during its second insurrection.
AKD silently listened to the NSSP comrade acknowledging the gravity of the incident. He has publicly responded on numerous occasions to the violence blamed upon the JVP, saying that it was something that should not have happened and was an inevitable situation when state-sponsored terrorism was rampant.
On the other hand, Dr. Wickramabahu Karunarathna acknowledged that the left parties also had weapons supplied to them by the state.
