Provinces of Sri Lanka

Province පළාත மாகாணம்
Category	First level administrative division
Location	Sri Lanka
Created	1 October 1833
Number	9
Populations	1,061,315–5,851,130
Areas	3,684–10,472 km2
Government	Provincial council
Subdivisions	District

This article contains Indic text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks or boxes, misplaced vowels or missing conjuncts instead of Indic text.

Provinces (Sinhala: පළාත, romanized: Paḷāta; Tamil: மாகாணம், romanized: Mākāṇam) are the first level administrative divisions of Sri Lanka. Currently, Sri Lanka is divided into 9 provinces. Each province is further divided into districts, which are further divided into divisional secretariats.

The provinces were first established by the British rulers of Ceylon in 1833. Over the next century, most of the administrative functions of the provinces were transferred to the districts, the second level administrative division of the country. By the middle of the 20th century, the provinces had become mostly ceremonial. This changed in 1987 when, following several decades of increasing demand for decentralization, the 13th Amendment to the 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka established provincial councils.^[1][2]