Dr. Rajani Thiranagama (née Rajasingham) (23 February 1954 – 21 September 1989) was a Tamil human rights activist and feminist who was assassinated allegedly by Tamil Tigers cadres after she had criticised them for their atrocities. At the time of her assassination, she was the head of the Department of Anatomy at the University of Jaffna and an active member of University Teachers for Human Rights, Jaffna, and was is one of its founding members. Biography Early life and education Rajani was born in Jaffna, in northern Sri Lanka, to middle-class Tamil Christian parents. She was the second of four female children. She attended primary and secondary school in Jaffna, and in 1973, she entered the University of Colombo to study medicine. In university, she became actively involved in student politics. Marriage and children During her stay at Colombo University she met a politically active student leader from Kelaniya University named Dayapala Thiranagama. Dayapala was from a rural Sinhala Buddhist background. Rajani broke ethnic and religious barriers and married Dayapala in 1977. They had two daughters: Narmada (1978) and Sharika, 1980. Narmada now lives in Britain and works for the public sector union UNISON. Political Anthropologist Sharika Thiranagama currently teaches at Stanford University, and is married to fellow anthropologist Thomas Blom Hansen. In 2005, Sharika portrayed the role of her mother in a documentary film on Rajani, No More Tears Sister. Medical profession In 1978, Rajani began her first posting as an intern medical doctor at the Jaffna Hospital. After the completion of the internship in 1979, she travelled to Haldumulla, a small village near Haputale, to work as a medical doctor. By 1980 she had returned to Jaffna as a lecturer in anatomy at the newly formed Faculty of Medicine at the University of Jaffna. By then, Jaffna was a battle zone and in the early stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War. Many were leaving Jaffna for Colombo or migrating to other countries, including the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia. Links with LTTE Inspired by her elder sister Nirmala, then a member of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Rajani became involved with the LTTE by administering care to those wounded in action. In 1983, Rajani travelled to England under Commonwealth scholarship for postgraduate studies in anatomy at the Liverpool Medical School. There, she launched a major international campaign for the release of her sister, who was imprisoned in