1952 Ceylonese parliamentary election

Parliamentary elections were held in Ceylon in 1952. It is notable for being the second and final election overseen and administered by the Department of Parliamentary Elections before its merger in 1955.[1]

1952 Ceylonese parliamentary election
24–30 May 1952
95 seats in the House of Representatives of Ceylon
48 seats were needed for a majority
  First party Second party Third party
 
Leader Dudley Senanayake S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike N.M. Perera
Party UNP SLFP LSSP
Leader since 1952 1951 1945
Leader's seat Dedigama Attanagalla Ruwanwella
Last election 39.81%, 42 seats – 10.81%, 10 seats
Seats won 54 9 9
Seat change Increase12 New Decrease1
Popular vote 1,026,005 361,250 305,133
Percentage 44.08% 15.52% 13.11%
Prime Minister before election

Dudley Senanayake
UNP

 Prime Minister-designate

Dudley Senanayake
UNP

Background

Prime Minister D.S. Senanayake died in March 1952, and was succeeded by his son, Dudley. The national wave of mourning for Ceylon's first prime minister greatly boosted the UNP's fortunes.

The 1952 election was the first contested by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, which had broken away from the UNP on a platform of Sinhala nationalism, and the Illankai Tamil Arasu Kachchi (Federal Party), which split from the All Ceylon Tamil Congress over joining the UNP government.

Results

Because the estate Tamils had been stripped of their citizenship by the Senanayake government, the Ceylon Indian Congress, which most of them had supported, was eliminated from Parliament and the Lanka Sama Samaja Party lost seats. The UNP won a majority, mainly at the cost of the CIC and the LSSP.

PartyVotes%Seats
United National Party1,026,00544.0854
Sri Lanka Freedom Party361,25015.529
Lanka Sama Samaja Party305,13313.119
CPC–VLSSP134,5285.784
All Ceylon Tamil Congress64,5122.774
Illankai Tamil Arasu Kachchi45,3311.952
Republican Party33,0011.420
Ceylon Labour Party27,0961.161
Buddhist Republican Party3,9870.170
Independents326,78314.0412
Total2,327,626100.0095
Total votes2,114,615–
Registered voters/turnout2,990,91270.70
Source: Nohlen et al.[2]

Notes

    References
    1. "Elections Department in the limelight". ft.lk. Daily Financial Times. 3 October 2015. Retrieved 4 February 2018.
    2. Dieter Nohlen, Florian Grotz & Christof Hartmann (2001) Elections in Asia: A data handbook, Volume I, pp709–722 ISBN 0-19-924958-X
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