History

Hanwella is one of the historic places in the ancient Seethawaka Kingdom. The Kelani river, one of the major rivers in motherland flows alongside the town. Hanwella Rajasinghe Central College was established instead of 'Hanwella bilingual school' and inaugurated in 1886 in the premises where the present divisional educational office is situated.

At the time that the "Free education to all from primary level to the university" was introduced by Dr. C.W.W. Kannangara (The Minister of education) this school was named as 'Hanwella Madhya Maha Vidyalaya'. This was the 20th Madhya maha vidyalaya in ceylon which was belonging to the 3rd category. At that time the present central school was insufficient to cope to the 600 pupils, therefore the school was shifted to a new place called 'Lancia meru godalla'.

Captain D.S. Gunasekara and committee of villagers had collected the money (Rs.12000) from villagers and bought this plot of land (Lancia meru godalla) from Mr. Thepanis Welikalla Appuhami and presented it in 1946 to the Dr. C.W.W. Kannangara who was the minister of education at that time. The foundation stone for two storied building was laid on 21 December 1951, by the Capt. Gunasekara and it was opened in May 1953 by the Prime minister Hon. Dudley Senanayake and it was done by under the guidance of Mrs. Kusuma Gunawardena. This was a leading school in historic Seethawaka Kingdom. Mr. Philip Gunawardena (The minister of Parliament) proposed to rename 'Hanwella Madhya Maha Vidyalaya' as 'Hanwella Rajasinghe Central College' in 1968.