Key facts
- Country
- Sri Lanka
- Created
- 1 October 1833
- Provincial council
- 14 November 1987
- Capital
- Colombo
- Largest city
- Colombo
- Major cities
- List * Gampaha * Negombo * Kalutara * Kaduwela * Dehiwala * Kotte * Kesbewa * Moratuwa
- Districts
- List Colombo Gampaha Kalutara
- Type
- Provincial council
- Body
- Western Provincial Council
- Governor
- Hanif Yusuf
- Total
- 3,684 km (1,422 sq mi)
- Land
- 3,593 km (1,387 sq mi)
- Rank
- 9th (5.61% of total area)
- Density
- 1,731/km (4,483/sq mi)
- Sinhalese
- 4,905,425 (84.26%)
- Sri lankan moors
- 450,505 (7.74%)
- Sri lankan tamil
- 335,751 (5.77%)
- Indian tamil
- 61,826 (1.06%)
via Wikipedia infobox
~6 min read
Encyclopedic overview
The Western Province (Sinhala: බස්නාහිර පළාත Basnāhira Paḷāta; Tamil: மேல் மாகாணம் Mael Mākāṇam) is one of the nine provinces of Sri Lanka, the first level administrative division of the country. The provinces have existed since the 19th century but did not have any legal status until 1987 when the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka established provincial councils.
History
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Western Province” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.