Sri Lankan captain Dinesh Chandimal stood on brink of a half-century as the visitors, at 151/4, had tea on the first day of the second Test against India in Nagpur on Friday.
With Chandimal (47), wicketkeeper-batsman Niroshan Dickwella stood tall in front of the wicket scoring 18 runs.
After winning the toss, Sri Lanka opted to bat first though they failed to make a brisk start. Opener Sadeera Samarawickrama lost his wicket for 13 runs in the fifth over to Ishant Sharma, who appeared in great shape on Day 1.
Sharma took the scalp of another opener Dimuth Karunaratne in the 51st over, trapping him LBW for 51 runs.
Besides speedster Sharma, spin duo of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja also made merry of the struggling Lankans after they took the wicket of Lahiru Thirimanne (9) and Angelo Mathews (10) respectively.