Turnour Prize
The Turnour Prize is the oldest of the panel prizes at Royal College Colombo. It is one of the most prestigious prizes and honour awarded to a student of Royal College, the oldest public school in the country. Awarded annually to the best student in performance in academics. First awarded in 1846 to C. A. Lorensz, it was instituted by Hon. George Turnour of the Ceylon Civil Service.[1]
The award should not be confused with the Dornhorst Memorial Prize awarded for General Merit and the Lalith Athulathmudali Memorial Prize awarded to the most outstanding Royalist of the year.
Notable winners of the Turnour Prize include Deshamanya C.A. Coorey, former Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Finance & Treasury, Sir Thomas De Sampayo, former Judge of the Supreme Court of Ceylon and Professor Osmund Jayaratne former President of the Colombo Campus, University of Sri Lanka.
Winners of the Turnour Prize
- Charles Ambrose Lorensz (1846)
- Frederick Nell (1846)
- Sir Muthu Coomaraswamy (1851)
- Sir James Peiris
- Sir Marcus Fernando
- Sir Thomas De Sampayo
- Deshamanya C.A. Coorey
- Professor Osmund Jayaratne
- Dr M R P (Ranji) Salgado
- Gamini Iriyagolla
- Professor R.S. Thanabalasundaram
- Professor Chelvanayakam Vaseeharan
- Ananda S Pelimuhandiram (1966)
- Professor Rohan Abeyaratne (1967)
- Professor Mohan Maheswaran Kumaraswamy (1968)
- Professor Gnanalingam Anandalingam (1969)
- J Niranjan Selvadurai (1970)
- C I Gunasena (1971)
- Dr Gnanalingam Arjavalingam (1972)
- Dr Ratnasabapathy Sashidharan (1975)
- A D Nilanga (2005)
- Charith Mendis
Fictional winners
- Carlaboy von Bloss
See also
- George Turnour
- Dornhorst Memorial Prize
- Lalith Athulathmudali Memorial Prize
- Royal Crown (Royal College Colombo)
- Lorensz Scholarship