About

In 2004, the Asian Tsunami, devastated the Eastern and Southern coastline of Sri Lanka. Like any other country, Sri Lanka did not have the capacity to deal with the enormous mental health consequences of a disaster of this scale. The UK-SLTG was in the forefront of the psychosocial response and undertook to mobilise help from the UK in this area. King’s College London was the first to respond and directed its development office to work with UK-SLTG to develop a proposal to submit to the UK Disasters and Emergency Committee (DEC) for a grant to establish a centre in Sri Lanka to build capacity. 

The Catholic Agency for International Development (CAFOD), a member of the DEC, responded with a generous grant to establish such a centre.
In 2006, with this grant and donations from King’s College London, and the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust and local partners, UK-SLTG was able to establish Samutthāna – the King’s College London Centre for Trauma Displacement and Mental Health in Colombo with outposts in Jaffna, Batticaloa and Hambantota.

Samutthāna – meaning ‘renewal and regeneration’ in Sanskrit – is an active and vibrant organisation which has, and continue to make a significant contribution to the mental health field in Sri Lanka. Among its many achievements include, helping to establish the first clinical psychology training course in the country at the University of Colombo in 2008 which has graduated more than 70 clinical psychologists. It has had over 55,000 attendances in its workshops and courses. 

When another disaster struck Sri Lanka in 2019, ‘the Easter bombings’ the psychosocial response was swift and effective and we are proud to record that each individual who was in the frontline of the psychosocial response had attended at least one training event at Samutthāna, indicating an achievement in capacity building. In 2025, the Samutthāna Board approved a proposal for us to be provider of counselling and consulting services and this has taken off well.