(Postgraduate Institute of Archaeology – University of Kelaniya)

An Ordinance made in 1985 by the University Grants Commission under the Universities Act, No. 16 of 1978, established the Postgraduate Institute of Archaeology (PGIAR). The Ordinance, cited as the Postgraduate Institute of Archaeology Ordinance, No. 2 of 1985, came into force on 1 January 1986. The founding Director of the Institute was Prof. Senake Banadaranayake, The PGIAR began its career in a small room at the Central Cultural Fund’s Head Office at 212, Bauddaloka Mawatha, with the curtsy of Dr. Roland Silva, the then Director General of the Central Cultural Fund and then it expanded its activities and its library to a Room at the then Institute of Aesthetics Studies’ Art and Design section (currently the Art and Design Faculty of the University of Performing and Fine Arts) on the Horton Place. In August 1993, the PGIAR moved its entire operations and offices to the current premises, which it acquired in 1999.

The PGIAR began its academic activities with a single permanent faculty and a large body of visiting faculty. The first teaching program it launched was the Certificate Course in the Conservation of Cultural Property, which was launched in January 1986. This program addressed a vital need in the field of cultural property conservation. It began its Postgraduate programs in June 1986 with the Master of Science in Archaeology, and in 1990, it started the most popular archaeology program in the country, the Postgraduate Diploma in Archaeology, which is considered a conversion degree for non-archaeology graduates to enter the field. The Postgraduate Diploma Program attracted hundreds of students from diverse backgrounds and contributed substantially to popularising archaeology as a primary discipline in the 1990s.

Since its inception, the PGIAR has played a pivotal role in Sri Lankan archaeology and archaeology education; it has contributed to every aspect of the country's archaeology scene and helped define the future of the field. It organized the first national Archaeological Congress in November 1986, and did the same in the following year. The PGIAR also organized a special archaeological conference on the archaeology of Ruhuna in 1988 at the University of Ruhuna.

As soon as the PGIAR came into being, it became the 'flagship institute for archaeology' in the country, and it could bring in large amounts of international funding support to train local archaeologists and to carry out large-scale archaeological projects in the country. In 1988, it received funding support from the Ford Foundation, the KAVA (Commission for General and Comparative Archaeology, Germany) and the SAREC (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency's Bilateral Department for Research Cooperation), and in 1994 from NORAD (Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation). PGIAR became the cynosure of Sri Lanka's archaeology and the center of gravity for the archaeological community in the country. Obviously, with its high-energy activities, it also had its own detractors!

The PGIAR conducts its research activities with treasury funds and funds received from various government institutions. In 2011, it diversified its academic programs into four main streams: Archaeology, Museology, Heritage and Art History, and the PGIAR offers postgraduate diplomas to PhDs in these four streams of specialization. 

The Postgraduate Institute of Archaeology (PGIAR) is the premier national institution dedicated to advanced teaching, research, and professional training in archaeology in Sri Lanka. Its establishment marked a major transformation in the development of archaeological scholarship and heritage management in the country.