Veteran trade union leader and General Secretary of Ceylon Mercantile, Industrial and General Workers Union Bala Tampoe passed away in Colombo at the age of 92.

Born on May 23, 1922 to a prominent family in Jaffna, he was educated at Royal College Colombo and gained a BSc degree from theUniversity of Ceylon in 1943. He received further education at  the University of London in 1944m and later studied law at the Colombo Law College.

He became a lecturer in Botany and Horticulture in the Department of Agriculture. He came into the limelight after his dismissal from public service, for participating in the strike of public servants in 1947. Soon after,  he joined a prominent trade union – the Ceylon Mercantile Union (CMU)

The CMU was originally built in 1928 as a while-collar union in the mercantile sector. After Tampoe became its general secretary in February 1948, the union came under the influence of the Lanka Sama Samaja Party.

In 1963, he led a strike in the Colombo Port that escalated into an all-island general strike and defied the government order when it invoked its emergency powers.

When the LSSP left the Fourth International to join the Bandaranaike government in 1964, Tampoe became a central leader of the Lanka Sama Samaja Party (Revolutionary)

He was known as a staunch supporter of JVP activists who were arrested during the 1971 uprising. He appeared for their cases as a lawyer without charging any fee.

He was widely respected among political circles as Sri Lanka’s most senior trade union leader and as a man who stood up indefatigably for his beliefs.