Bandaranaike, Sirimavo, << bahn drah NEE kee, `see` ree MAH vaw >> (1916-2000), was prime minister of Sri Lanka from 1960 to 1965, from 1970 to 1977, and from 1994 to 2000. She was the world’s first female prime minister. Her husband, S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, was prime minister from 1956 to 1959. After his assassination in 1959, she became president of his Sri Lanka Freedom Party. Although she had no political experience, she was elected prime minister in 1960.
Mrs. Bandaranaike continued her husband’s socialist policies. Her government took over various businesses and had a neutral foreign policy toward Communist and non-Communist countries. Opposition to her economic policies led to her party’s defeat in 1965, and she lost her office. Her party won the 1970 election, and she became prime minister again. She served until 1977, when her party was again defeated. In 1988, she ran for president. A 1978 constitutional amendment had made the president, rather than the prime minister, head of the government. Bandaranaike lost the election. Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, the daughter of Sirimavo and S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, was elected president of Sri Lanka in 1994 and reelected in 1999. She appointed Sirimavo Bandaranaike prime minister. Bandaranaike resigned as prime minister in 2000 because of poor health and died on Oct. 10, 2000. She was born on April 17, 1916, in Balangoda in south Ceylon (now Sri Lanka).
