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UK community honour and pay tribute to Mr Chanaka Olagama & Mrs Maria Olagama - 15th January 2011

Pictures by Nimal Navaratne & Bandula Manage
 

The community paid tribute to Mr and Mrs Olagama with a fabulous Dinner Dance comprising of over 150 people at the City Grange Hotel, London on Saturday 15th January 2011.  This was organised by the friends and well wishers of Chanaka Olagama and well supported by the Sri Lankans to the fabulous music of Suresh and the Breeze Band.

His Excellency Mr P M Amza, Acting High Commissioner for Sri Lanka in UK, and Mrs Amza, Mr Cyril Madeniya (CEO Bank of Ceylon Ltd), Mr and Mrs Victor Ramanan, Mr Azahim Mohamed (FOC President 2010) and many other distinguished guests were in attendance to support this event. 

The guests were welcomed by Mr Nalin Perera who admired Mr Olagama’s efforts to bring all communities together to improve the integration and cohesion between communities and said that it was an honour and a privilege to be a part of this great event. Mr Amza gave praise to Mr and Mrs Olagama for their hard work and commitment at a difficult time to make Sri Lankan Airlines successful and assist Sri Lankans to fly the National Airline.

Mr Chanaka Olagama was overwhelmed by the occasion and thanked the organisers: Mr Nalin Perera, Dr Ananda Thevathasan, Mr Kannan Sangaralingam and Mr Lalith Lenadora for putting up a splendid show.  The Sri Lankan Airline staff and many airline travel agents and tour operators were also present to enjoy and pay tribute to a great person.

Dr Ananda Thevathasan paid tribute to Chanaka Olagama for all his efforts to help Sri Lankan OBA’s, OGA’s and Associations in the past 3 years.  Mr Olagama supported the Festival of Cricket and was the brains behind the Cricket Fiesta last September 2010, in order to bring the Jaffna, Batticola, Kandy, Galle and Colombo OBA’s to play a limited over cricket tournament.  This notable achievement was the brainchild of Mr Chanaka Olagama, who wished that these school OBA’s will one day participate in the Festival of Cricket.

Chanaka was educated at Royal College, Colombo, where he excelled in sports, captaining the 1st X1 Football Team, playing cricket, table tennis and athletics.  His passion for cricket enabled him to play for Marble Hill Cricket Club in Richmond, where he opened the bowling and batted at No 2.

The music was well supported by Mr Mike Cooke, CEO MCG Group and Mr Deva Somasundaram, who added spice to the fabulous music of Suresh David.

Chanaka was a “people’s person”, where he excelled in communicating and helping many people in the airline industry.  We all will greatly miss such an outstanding sportsman and an ambassador of people, when he takes office in Colombo.  On behalf of the Sri Lankan community, we wish Mr and Mrs Olagama all the best  in their term of office in Colombo.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SESATHA - The Sri Lankan Event Portal in the UK