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Sri Lanka is mounting an urgent diplomatic campaign to save the life of a 24-year-old migrant worker sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia for a social media post that authorities deemed blasphemous against Islam and the Prophet Muhammad.
Anojan Sivarasa, the eldest son of Rasamanickam Yogalakshmi, was condemned after an appellate court in the kingdom escalated his punishment from a prison term to capital punishment, a decision that has triggered shockwaves across his home country and mobilised religious leaders, political parties and civil society groups alike.
Speaking through tears, Yogalakshmi made a direct appeal for her son's life. She asked for mercy for what she described as the wrongs committed by her child and pleaded with authorities to forgive him and return him to his family. The emotional plea has become a focal point of a case that has drawn attention well beyond Sri Lanka's shores.
The chain of events that placed Anojan on death row began in late June, when footage circulated widely on social media showing a young Muslim man kicking a dog as Hindu pilgrims passed by during a religious pilgrimage in Sri Lanka. The video ignited fierce sectarian arguments online, with users trading barbs across religious lines.
During that exchange, according to accounts provided to the BBC, another user posted derogatory remarks about a Hindu deity. Anojan responded in Tamil with a comment insulting the Prophet Muhammad. He deleted the post almost immediately and uploaded an apology video, but the damage had already been done: his comment had been screenshotted and sent to his employer and, subsequently, to Saudi officials.
Anojan was arrested in July. His personal devices were seized, and Saudi authorities deleted his social media accounts. His brother, Hamsidan Sivarasa, told BBC Sinhala that people in Saudi Arabia had been unaware of the matter until individuals in Sri Lanka emailed the company where Anojan worked. He declined to identify those responsible, saying only that he did not wish to mention who they were.
The employer then notified Saudi authorities, who opened a case against the young worker. Anojan was initially convicted by the Al-Ahsa Criminal Court and sentenced to five years in prison along with a fine of three million Saudi riyals, equivalent to roughly $800,000 or £600,000. An appeal seeking to reduce that sentence was rejected, according to Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath.
The case then took a far more severe turn. On 17 September, Saudi prosecutors filed an appeal arguing that Anojan should be prosecuted under Sharia law rather than the kingdom's cybercrime legislation. The appellate court granted the request and increased his sentence to death, a development that stunned his family and Sri Lankan officials.
Back in Sri Lanka, the response has been unusually broad. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed it is taking every available step to assist Anojan. His family met President Anura Kumara Dissanayake at the Presidential Secretariat on 21 September, where the president assured them that his government would spare no effort to secure a general pardon and instructed diplomatic channels to engage Saudi authorities.
The case has also forged rare cross-religious solidarity. Senior Buddhist leaders, including the Mahanayake Theros of the Ramanna Nikaya and the Amarapura Maha Nikaya, joined Hindu religious leaders in handing over a memorandum to the Presidential Secretariat calling for urgent state intervention. Multiple political parties and government bodies have coordinated diplomatic efforts seeking clemency, reflecting the sensitivity of the matter in a country where religious tensions can flare quickly.
A four-member Sri Lankan legal delegation is travelling to Saudi Arabia this week to meet Anojan's local defence lawyers. Upul Kumarapperuma, a President's Counsel and member of the team, told BBC Sinhala that two law firms in the kingdom are handling the case and that the delegation intends to discuss the matter and plan the next steps. The involvement of senior legal figures signals how seriously Colombo is treating the appeal.
Yet the family's distress has been compounded by a complete breakdown in communication. Hamsidan said on 28 September that his brother had not called for two days, and that although the embassy was informed and asked to investigate, no response had been received. In Saudi prisons, inmates on death row typically lose access to personal mobile devices, with formal calls facilitated strictly through prison authorities, leaving relatives reliant on official channels that can be slow and opaque.
Compounding the anxiety is the fact that Saudi Arabia has no published execution timeline in such cases. The kingdom has a history of carrying out executions without warning families or foreign embassies, informing relatives only after the sentence has been carried out. For Anojan's mother and siblings, that means each passing day carries the weight of not knowing whether he is still alive.
The Sri Lankan government has instructed the family to refrain from making further statements while diplomatic efforts proceed, a request that underscores the delicate nature of negotiations with Riyadh. The family has not heard from Anojan since 28 September.
Human rights organisations have repeatedly raised alarms about severe punishments for online speech in Saudi Arabia. In July 2023, retired Saudi school teacher Mohammed Al Ghamdi was sentenced to death over comments posted on multiple social media platforms, according to the United Nations. Amnesty International's Philip Luther described the sentence at the time as ludicrous, noting that Al Ghamdi had just ten followers across two anonymous Twitter accounts and was accused of nothing more than expressing opinions. That ruling was later overturned and replaced with a 30-year prison term, according to ALQST, an independent non-governmental organisation promoting human rights in Saudi Arabia.
The context of Anojan's case is further shaped by the scale of migration between the two countries. More than 10 million foreign workers live in Saudi Arabia, many from South Asia, sending remittances home and often lacking the legal protections and social standing of citizens. Their vulnerability to harsh penalties for online activity has become a growing concern for labour-sending nations, and Anojan's fate is likely to sharpen that debate in Sri Lanka and beyond.
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