The Jaffna Public Library was burned by an organized mob of Sinhalese police and army on the night of 31 May 1981, on the orders of members of the ruling UNP party. The library's burning was one of the most violent examples of ethnically motivated biblioclasm of the 20th century. At the time of its destruction, the library was one of the biggest in Asia, containing over 97,000 books and manuscripts.