Tissa Abeysekara, a top award-winning film director, died at the Colombo National Hospital Saturday evening.

He was under treatment after he suddenly fell ill last week. He was 70.

He made his debut to the Sinhala silver screen in the early 1960s as a screenplay writer and later directed some box office hits including like Karumakkarayo, Mahagedara and Viragaya.

In 1996, Deshabandu Tissa Abeysekara won turned tables on the prestigious Gratiaen Prize for the best piece of Creative Writing in English by a resident Sri Lankan.

He was equally fluent in both Sinhala and English, very widely read and was a strong supporter of the LSSP from its heyday.