The announcement came after Buddhists and Muslims clashed in the island nation's central district of Kandy.
India is closely watching developments in Sri Lanka, where the government on Tuesday declared a state of emergency in order to control communal violence. This is the second country, after Maldives, in India's southern neighbhood – that has imposed emergency in the country. Though, officially the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) declined to comment, describing it an internal issue of the island nation, officials said they were watching the situation closely. In the case of Maldives, India had publicly expressed its displeasure.
Sri Lankan authorities said the emergency has been imposed for 10 days as a precautionary measure. The announcement came after Buddhists and Muslims clashed in the island nation's central district of Kandy.
The majority Sinhalese ethnic group attacked dozens of Muslim businesses and houses, besides damaging at least one mosque. At least one person was killed. Hundreds of security personnel, including special forces, were deployed to Kandy on Monday and a curfew was declared there. Muslims in Sri Lanka are mostly of Tamil origin.
In another separate incident last week in Ampara, it was alleged that a restaurant mixed sterilising medicine with food. A religious undertone was given to that incident. It was alleged that organised groups carried out the violence in both incidents.
Reports said tension has been growing between the two communities in Sri Lanka over the past year, with some hardline Buddhist groups accusing Muslims of forcing people to convert to Islam and vandalising Buddhist archaeological sites. There were also protests against the presence of Rohingya asylum-seekers in the country.
"At a special cabinet meeting, it was decided to declare a state of emergency for 10 days to prevent the spread of communal riots to other parts of the country," government spokesman Dayasiri Jayasekara, was quoted as saying by state media. "It was also decided to take stern action against people who instigate violence through Facebook," he added, referring to postings on social media.
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