For South Asian Heritage Month, archivists and curators from LSE Library delve into the LSE student files archives to spotlight three LSE alumni from the region. In the third of the series, curator Daniel Payne explores the student file of Kusala Vichitra Abhayavardhana (née Fernando) who studied sociology at LSE in the 1950s and entered politics in Sri Lanka, becoming a Member of Parliament in 1970.

Born in 1920 in Colombo, Ceylon (which would become the Republic of Sri Lanka in 1972), Kusala Abhayavardhana (née Fernando) came to study for a degree in sociology at LSE. In her application form she notes she was staying at an address in Bethnal Green. Under her career history she writes: “Married 1946 and have since done voluntary social welfare work in rural districts of North Western Province, Ceylon”.

Kusala struggled with her studies at LSE, owing to her father’s ongoing illness. This meant she had to interrupt her studies and her student file traces this struggle. Comments from her teachers in school reports show these difficulties, and one tutor notes: “…she deserves credit for the way in which she has pulled herself together and set her course in very trying circumstance”.

Kusala’s student file also contains newspaper clippings which show she was a keen rower during her time at LSE, getting involved in the life of the School beyond her studies. She is photographed being coached at LSE’s Club House in Chiswick by captain of the Women’s Boat Club Miss Kay Dicks.

Her student file also includes a fascinating letter she wrote to then-Director of LSE Ralf Dahrendorf about the political situation in Sri Lanka in 1977, decades after she had left LSE.

After LSE, Kusala served as a councillor on the Colombo Municipal Council, and in 1970 won a seat at the General Election as the Lanka Sama Samaja Party candidate. She worked as national Chair of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom and was the founding secretary of the International Women’s Year Sri Lanka.

More about LSE and South Asia

Student files along with the archive collections at LSE Library are a very rich and untapped resource for researching the connections between LSE and South Asia. LSE Library would love to do more work on this, and we’re very keen to hear from people interested in researching our collections and sharing their findings – take a look at our project page Traces of South Asia for more information.

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