Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga (born 1945) was President of Sri Lanka from 1994 to 2005, the first and so far only woman to hold the office. She is the daughter of two prime ministers, S.W.R.D. and Sirimavo Bandaranaike.
She studied political science in Paris and worked in land reform before entering politics. Her husband, the actor and politician Vijaya Kumaratunga, was assassinated in 1988. She became Prime Minister in August 1994 and President in November of the same year, campaigning on a platform of negotiated settlement to the civil war. She survived an assassination attempt in December 1999, losing the sight in one eye. Her presidency included repeated attempts at a negotiated peace and constitutional reform.