{"id":2188,"date":"2008-07-12T17:54:43","date_gmt":"2008-07-12T09:54:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/indian\/2008\/07\/12\/pi-balasubramaniam-was-hindraf-supporter\/"},"modified":"2008-07-12T17:55:00","modified_gmt":"2008-07-12T09:55:00","slug":"pi-balasubramaniam-was-hindraf-supporter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/indian\/2008\/07\/12\/pi-balasubramaniam-was-hindraf-supporter\/","title":{"rendered":"PI Balasubramaniam was Hindraf supporter"},"content":{"rendered":"
Balasubramaniam, the investigator who created history and place in Malaysian Book of Records for making two statutory declarations in the space of 24 hours was quite involved in the Hindraf movement, and subsequently in the opposition parties, writes a guest columnist in the Star<\/a>. This makes us think if Bala, being inclined towards the opposition, could have been manipulated. Secondly, its highlighted that Bala was in under financial strain after testifying, so there’s insinuiation that money could have played a role in his record making efforts.<\/p>\n

However, since its under investigation, let’s wait for more details. <\/p>\n

The former policeman is a small fry caught in the eye of a raging political storm and the Hindraf movement.<\/p>\n

FORMER Special Branch detective Balasubramaniam Perumal left the police force in a cloud and despite early success as a private investigator had recently struggled in his business, relatives, friends and former colleagues say.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a man of few words,\u201d says friend Raja Sundram Pillay, 43.<\/p>\n

Bala, as he is fondly called, left the force some years back after an incident involving his service revolver, his former colleagues said. It is unclear what the issue was but he resigned.<\/p>\n

As a private investigator, Bala mostly collected evidence for divorce cases and started at RM50 an hour.<\/p>\n

Mostly apolitical, Bala had an awakening after the Hindraf rally. He attended out of curiosity, and was immediately hooked to the cause, his friends said.<\/p>\n

Raja first met Bala at the Jalan Duta court complex in January when the habeas corpus application of the five Hindraf leaders held under the ISA was being heard. \u201cThat\u2019s where I first met him and we hit off immediately. He did not talk much but was a gem of a guy,\u201d says Raja, a marketing trainer for Amway Malaysia. “Bala was a strong supporter of Hindraf and agreed with the grievances they raised but he was only that \u2013 a supporter,\u201d says Raja. \u201cHe never pushed any political agenda but donated to and supported the cause strongly. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere were about a dozen of us. We were all strangers who met either at the rally or during the many court cases involving the Hindraf leaders. \u201cAfter that we met often and discussed how to help ? we were all excited and hooked on politics,\u201d adds Raja. \u201cAll of us like Bala had been at the Nov 25 Hindraf rally.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the course of supporting Hindraf, Bala and friends developed links with PKR and the DAP. During the March 8 general election the group decided to split and actively campaign for different candidates from these parties. <\/p>\n

Bala and a few friends ended up spending two weeks actively campaigning for DAP leader A. Sivanesan, now a Perak state executive councillor, who was contesting in the Sungkai state seat. \u201cBala and his group turned up on nomination day and offered their services for free,\u201d says Sivanesan.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a hard worker and a good organiser. He came across as someone sincere and dedicated. He even slept on the floor. \u201cHe was there cheering on polling night when the results were announced,\u201d says Sivanesan. \u201cI owe him and his team a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

After retracting his explosive statutory declaration at a hotel here on Sunday, Bala disappeared with his wife and three children aged nine, 10 and 11.<\/p>\n

All his friends are still in shock not only over the fact that Bala had overnight become a \u201cbig player\u201d but also over the sudden retraction.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was hero one day and zero the next,\u201d says another Hindraf friend.<\/p>\n

Bala left hurriedly, leaving his Honda CRV parked in the porch of his house and two Rottweilers, named Monty and interestingly, Shaariibuu, locked in their cages.<\/p>\n

\u201cI called him on Sunday morning after reading the newspapers and he sounded like a hounded man,\u201d says A. Thanaletchumi, a friend from Sungkai. \u201cHe was so reluctant to speak.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a private investigator, friends say Bala was earning enough to buy a new Honda CRV, a second-hand Proton Saga for his wife and a big bike for himself and extensively renovated his house in Rawang, but strangely his business began to dry up after he testified at the Altantuya Shaariibuu murder trial last year.<\/p>\n

His friends don\u2019t know why but by March Bala was \u201cvery nearly broke\u201d and made the rounds at law firms looking for investigative jobs. \u201cHe asked me to put the word out that he needed jobs,\u201d says a lawyer who declined to be named. \u201cI recommended him to my colleagues. I don\u2019t know what jobs he got.\u201d<\/p>\n

In April, despite his financial situation, Bala stood for and was elected chairman of the Rawang Tamil School\u2019s Parent- Teacher Association. \u201cHe was very proud of it and was full of plans to raise money to add more classrooms as the school was crowded with over 1,000 students,\u201d says a teacher friend.<\/p>\n

On June 28, Bala took his family to Sungkai for a 15-table election victory dinner with Sivanesan. \u201cHe paid for one table and enjoyed himself with his family and a few close friends,\u201d says Sivanesan. \u201cHe was very happy and did not show or give any inkling of the dramatic revelations he was to make on July 1.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bala seemed normal to all his close friends right up to the explosive press conference with PKR de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn Friday I heard rumours of a bombshell event involving Bala. \u201cI sent him an SMS text enquiring about it and he just replied: \u2018Read Anwar\u2019s website\u2019. \u201cWe are all in a state of shock,\u201d says Raja. \u201cOnly Bala can clear the air.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Balasubramaniam, the investigator who created history and place in Malaysian Book of Records for making two statutory declarations in the space of 24 hours was quite involved in the Hindraf movement, and subsequently in the opposition parties, writes a guest columnist in the Star. This makes us think if Bala, being inclined towards the opposition, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[117,21],"class_list":["post-2188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-indian","tag-crime","tag-hindraf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2188\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}