Aug 09, Colombo: Higher Education Minister of Sri Lanka S.B. Dissanayake says the country's entire university system has not come to a standstill due to the strike by a group of university lecturers.

Dissanayake has told parliament that lecturers in four universities and the Trincomalee Campus have not participated in the ongoing strike.

The Minister has explained to the House that the demand of the university lecturers for a salary hike was unfair since the university lecturers have been granted a massive salary hike at the last budget.

According to Dissanayake, some of the demands put forward by the lecturers were laughable.

The Minister has made these comments in response to a statement by Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremasinghe that the government needed to take measures to address the strike launched by the university lecturers since it has affected the country's university system.

However media reports say the continuous strike launched by the university academics belonging to the Federation of University Teachers Association (FUTA) from July 4th has hampered the educational activities at the universities.

The FUTA has launched the continuous strike despite the salary increment granted by the Ministry of Higher Education as, according to FUTA, the strike is based on broader demands to find solutions to other problems of the universities.