Rose Wijeysekera (LLB, MPhil, Ph.D. in Law) is the Chair Professor of the Department of Private and Comparative Law. She joined the Faculty of Law, University of Colombo in 1995, and has headed the Department of Private and Comparative Law from 2015 – 2019. During her sabbatical leave from 2019-2021, she headed the Asia Pacific Institute for Information Technology (APIIT)’s Law School, which offer Staffordshire University LLB degree. Her primary research interests have been on Family Law, Children’s Rights, Women’s Rights and Gender studies. She’s currently the Gender Consultant to a field-based research on Language Rights, Gender Equality and Women Empowerment’. Prof. Wijeyesekera has special interest in empowerment of women through training, and has trained female candidates to the National Parliament and Local Government Bodies, Officers of Local Government Bodies, the Police and members of armed forces, Civil Society Organizations, Gender Focal Points, Child Rihts Promotion Officers, etc. Her latest training focuses on scaling up supoort mechanisms to women and girls victims of cyber sexual violence. She also serves as a Visiting Lecturer and Examiner at the University of Jaffna, Faculty of Graduate Studies at the University of Colombo as well as Kothalawala Defence University, the Open University Sri Lanka and the Bandaranayake International Diplomatic Training Institute. She has been a Consultant to the Sectoral Oversight Committee on Women and Gender, Parliament of Sri Lanka, and has served in several Law Reform Committees at national level, including the Advosory Committee on reforming the Adoption and Fostercare Law reform, Law Reform Committee (Children-definitions) both of which she headed, and Family Law Reform Committee and National the Committee which recommended the introduction of law to the national school curriculum. Prof. Wijeyesekera won the Senate Award for Research Excellence (Law) in 2017.
Head of the Department
Department of Private and Comparative Law, Faculty of Law, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka.