The Island
Minister of Supplementary Plantation Crops Development Dharmadasa Banda yesterday said that the Hingurana sugar factory, estimated at Rs. 300 million, had been sold for Rs. 128 million but the buyer eventually paid only Rs. 25 million.
Responding to a query raised by JVP MP Wasantha Piyatissa, Minister Banda said that the balance payment could not be recovered as the buyer had passed away.
He identified the buyer as S. Arumugam and the year of transaction as 1993, the tail end of the UNP regime. The then PA government had acquired the factory in 1995 and two years later its production process had collapsed.
At the time of the privatisation, 1,814 persons had been employed there, he said.