Jayadeva Uyangoda

{{short description|Sri Lankan political scientist (born 1950)}}

{{BLP sources|date=March 2011}}

{{use dmy dates|date=September 2020}}

{{Infobox person

|name = Jayadeva Uyangoda

|birth_name =

|other_names = U-mahathaya

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|birth_date = {{birth date and age|df=yes|1950|09|13}}

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|birth_place = Matara, Sri Lanka

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|nationality = {{flagicon|Sri Lanka}} Sri Lankan

|education = PhD

|occupation = University professor

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Jayadeva Uyangoda (born 13 September 1950) is a Sri Lankan political scientist.{{cite news|url=http://www.lankabusinessonline.com/fullstory.php?nid=686102785 |title=Sri Lanka tsunami aid becomes geopolitical game - LANKA BUSINESS ONLINE |date=3 January 2005 |work=Lanka Business Online |access-date=27 March 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110930142600/http://www.lankabusinessonline.com/fullstory.php?nid=686102785 |archive-date=30 September 2011 }}{{cite news|url=http://www.dailynews.lk/2010/02/12/fea02.asp |title='Minoritarianizing' voter-mind and other academic slippages |last=Malinda |date=12 February 2010 |work=Daily News (Sri Lanka) |access-date=27 March 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100217060353/http://www.dailynews.lk/2010/02/12/fea02.asp |archive-date=17 February 2010 }}{{cite news|url=http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JA05Df03.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080513222324/http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JA05Df03.html|url-status=unfit|archive-date=13 May 2008|title=Sri Lanka takes off the gloves|last=Ramachandran|first=Sudha|date=5 January 2008|work=Asia Times|access-date=27 March 2011}} He is a constitutional expert in Sri Lanka.

Jayadewa Uyangoda was a leftist student leader and a member of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) movement in the 1970s.Alles AC.Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna.From 1971–1989 He was arrested following the aborted insurrection of 1971 and was imprisoned by the courts. Later, he was released with other JVP rebels on an unconditional pardon by the newly appointed Jayawardena Regime in late 1970s. Having released from the jail, he did his doctoral research in the University of Hawaii on Nationalism and State Formation in Bangladesh. He remains one of Sri Lanka's most veteran commentators on ethnic conflict and human rights. He worked with Neelan Tiruchelvam in drafting the model constitution in 1999.

{{As of|2012|5}}, Uyangoda is a professor in the Department of Political Science and Public Policy at the University of Colombo,{{cite web |title=Department of Political Science and Public Policy |url=http://www.cmb.ac.lk/academic/arts/politic/Staff.htm |publisher=University of Colombo |access-date=1 May 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120810014610/http://www.cmb.ac.lk/academic/arts/politic/Staff.htm |archive-date=10 August 2012}} and founder-director of the Centre for Policy Research and Analysis, Colombo. He is a former chairman of the Sri Lanka Foundation in Colombo.

Uyangoda was the founder editor and later co-editor of Pravada, an academic journal in English that focuses on Sri Lanka and South Asia. He continues to write prolifically in Sinhala and English.