Minister of Health and Mass Media Dr Nalinda Jayatissa stated that the previous procedure for student admissions to the Faculty of Medicine at the General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University (KDU) will resume, following a suspension to re-evaluate the process.

“We had a discussion with the Chancellor of the university and the Prime Minister regarding this matter. For several years now, KDU has been admitting students to its medical faculty—this includes cadets, foreign students, and local students as well,” the Minister explained.

He noted that although admissions were halted for about one to two weeks, the decision has now been made to continue with the process as it was conducted previously.

“The decision to pause admissions wasn’t a permanent one. I clearly stated this in Parliament too. We needed time to reassess the situation—to evaluate how many cadets, foreign, and local students would be joining. Based on that assessment, the new decision was made,” he said.

Dr Jayatissa emphasised that this was not a newly introduced policy but rather a continuation of an existing process after a brief review period.