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After polishing off the remaining four wickets in quick time to restrict India to 426 in the first innings, the in-form Dilshan (112) took centrestage with a fine exhibition of strokeplay to steer the islanders to a comfortable 275 for three at close on the second day.
Dilshan notched up his 10th Test century -- and the fifth this year -- to lay the foundation for a strong Lankan reply in excellent batting conditions at the Motera stadium which again saw more than 300 runs being scored.
Mahela Jayawardene (36) and Thilan Samaraweera (45) were at the crease at stumps with the visitors still trailing the hosts by 151 runs.
Earlier, resuming at the score of 385-6, India lost their last four wickets for 41 runs and were all out soon after the first drinks break to allow the visitors to claw their way back into the game.
The Lankan batsmen then ensured that they kept the team in the hunt for their maiden Test win on Indian soil by batting sensibly right through the day.
Captain Kumar Sangakkara (31) and young opener Tharanga Paranavitana (35) got the starts but could not translate those into big knocks, falling to injudicious shots.
Paceman Zaheer Khan struck twice in quick succession by evicting Dilshan and Sangakkara in the last session with short-pitched deliveries to bring India back into the game but Jayawardene and Samaraweera ensured that there were no further setbacks.
The morning session turned out to be quite disappointing for the hosts who could not really carry on the good work and saw the remaining four wickets fall without much resistance.
Left arm swing bowler Chanaka Welegedara got the important breakthrough early in the morning by getting rid of the well-set and ominous-looking Rahul Dravid at his overnight score of 177.
Dravid, looking all set to score his sixth double hundred, fell to the 10th ball he faced without any addition to his overnight score. He dragged a ball from Welegedara on to his stumps while trying to drive on the front foot.
In all, the Bangalore stalwart batted for 19 minutes over six hours, faced 261 balls and struck 26 fours and a six. Dravid's departure just a quarter hour into day two dashed India's hopes of taking the score to the 500 mark.
Harbhajan Singh (22), not out 2 last evening, and Zaheer Khan (12) put on a brief stand worth 25 runs, but it was just a matter of time before they fell.
Zaheer, who was felled by a beamer from fast medium bowler Dammika Prasad after having struck two successive fours with slashes off the right-arm bowler, was trapped leg before when he played back to left arm spinner Rangana Herath.
The pace bowler's dismissal came soon after India crossed the 400-mark in the 96th over just past the half hour. Harbhajan, who played some good drives off the pace bowlers, was castled by Muttiah Muralitharan while trying to reverse sweep the wily off spinner who then accounted for last man Ishant Sharma in the same over to bring down curtains on the Indian innings.
Harbhajan's stay of 83 minutes yielded him two fours in 64 balls. Amit Mishra remained unbeaten on 7. For Lanka, left armer Welegedara grabbed the bowling honours, claiming 4 for 87 - the prized scalps being those of Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar, all on Monday, and Dravid.
Muralitharan, snapped up three for 97, taking two wickets on the second day for seven runs in 23 balls, while Prasad, who was not shy of using bumpers and got a warning for the beamer bowled at Zaheer, picked up 2 for 106. Herath took the lone remaining wicket.
Lankan openers Dilshan and Paranavitana then prevented the home team from creating an early breakthrough before lunch.
The only wicket that the visitors lost in the post-lunch session was that of young left-hander Tharanga Paranavitana (35), who edged Ishant Sharma to wicketkeeper Mahendra Singh Dhoni who caught it brilliantly one-handed by diving to the left in front of first slip Sachin Tendulkar.
Paranavitana, who looked hardly in trouble with Dilshan, was lured by a ball angled away from him and took the edge of his bat. He and his opening partner added 74 runs in quick time and Paranavitana hit six fours in his 55-ball knock.
This was the lone success for the Indian bowlers in the session between lunch and tea that yielded 118 runs in 26 overs.
Runs came at a brisk pace as the Lankans added 55 runs in 12 overs in the first post-lunch hour of play for Paranavitana's wicket and then 63 runs without losing a wicket in 14 overs till tea.
Dilshan, who has scored four centuries and over 900 runs this year, drove powerfully to the off side and played very few false strokes.
Both the pre-lunch and post-lunch sessions belonged to the visitors as they first fought back since yesterday’s position and dismissed the last four Indian wickets for only 41 runs this morning.
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Bravo Dravid you have done it again. Singlehandedly you got an historic win for India over Australia in Adelaide. Now you have shown the mettle you are made of once again.A man of substance sannot be put down easily.Congratulations on another milestone in your par excellence career.
Congratulations Dravid for reaching another milestone in your cricketing career. How many ever times the bunch of Jokers, i.e the selectors discard you during the selection and feel that u should be back when they find others not doing well, u have proved your consistency and passion for the game. There can be replacement for Sachin and others, but for your sound technique there can be no replacement and you are one amongst the best in the world in the game. Keep it up and we hope that u are not discarded with the whims and fancies of the selectors atleast from now onwards.
Congratualions Rahul on scroing 11000 runs Tests. You proved once again how valuble batsmen in Indian Team Keep going
Many a times in praising a genius like Sachin Tendulkar we tend to forget about a man whose contribution to indian cricket has been of the same magnitude, his name is Rahul Dravid. And today he reinforced the fact that how special he is.......Congratulations Dravid, wish to see you play in the next World Cup..
The pitch seems to be ideal for batting and hence I am unable to understand how the top-order batsmen including Gambhir/Sehwag & Tendulkar failed to score runs. This shows lack of application. Probably, the recent adulations have cluttered the minds of our cricketers. The miserable failure of Gambhir, Sehwag and Yuvraj in the recently concluded ODI series with Australia should be a lesson to these batsmen and they should try to score runs and not rest on their past laurels. I am sure, Sri Lanka will post a very healthy score as the pitch is a 'batsman's paradise'. I only hope that our bowlers will be able to restrict Sri Lanka as our bowling attack is not all that strong.
Sehwag is the most useless player in the Indian side. And as anticipated, the pitch becomes a batting beauty when the lankans bat.
Congratulation Dravid for reaching another high!! You are undoubtedly best cricketer in the world. you are most required in both oneday and test cricket, if India has to win consistently.
Heartiest congratulations Rahul on completing 11000 runs in tests.