Dr Jayampathy Wickramaratne joined the Sri Lankan Bar in 1977 and was appointed President’s Counsel in 2001. The principal area of his practice is public law.

He obtained a Master’s degree in Public Administration from the Postgraduate Institute of Management, University of Sri Jayewardenepura with a merit pass, specialising in ‘Development Administration’. He was awarded a PhD degree by the University of Peradeniya for his thesis on ‘Fundamental Rights in Sri Lanka’. The University of Colombo awarded him a PhD degree for his published work titled ‘Towards Democratic Governance in Sri Lanka: A Constitutional Miscellany’.

Dr Wickramaratne was a Member of Parliament from September 2015 to January 2020. He served as, Senior Advisor (Constitutional Affairs) to the President, Senior Advisor, Ministry of Constitutional Affairs, and Consultant, Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs. He was a member of the team that drafted the Constitution of the Republic of Sri Lanka Bill of 2000 and the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution. He chaired a committee appointed by the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Human Rights to draft a new constitutional bill of rights.