Mudliyar M. Seeman Fernando Sri Chandrasekera, more popularly known in his time, as Singho Appu Baasunnahe, was a man of a humble beginings. By sheer single minded perseverance, he rose from rags to fabulous riches. One of his daughters became the wife of Dr. W. A. de Silva, the national hero and builder of “Sravasti”. And among his grandchildren were Sir Susantha de Fonseka, one time Deputy Speaker of the State Council, Miss Cissy Cooray of Mahila Samithi fame, and Mrs. H. W. Amarasuriya.
Singho Appu Baasunnahe, later to become Mudliyar Sri Chandrasekera, munificent philanthropist, was born in the village of Horetuduwa, in Moratuwa. He began his adult life as a maker of the tea chests. (He was very proud of his humble beginnings, and would recount incidents from his early life with enormous delight.) As his business expanded and the money started coming in, he began to buy land for his requirements of timber for his industry. This was at the time that European planters of the British Raj were buying land for a song at land auctions to plant tea and coffee, and Singho Appu Baasunnahe out bid them all, settling all his transactions in cash which he carried around with him in large bags. (He was all his life, suspicious of cheque transactions).