Cult leader Balakrishnan kept his daughter captive for 30 years.
By Dileep Thekkethil
An Indian-origin man in the UK, Aravindan Balakrishnan, now 75, is currently facing trial after being accused of keeping women in captivity for more than 30 years, forcing them to indulge in sexual acts with him after he allegedly brainwashed his Maoist followers, making them believe that he is a godly figure and would die if they failed to follow his orders. He kept his daughter in captivity too.
According to reports, the Kerala-born Balakrishnan also kept his daughter, born out of a relationship with one of the captives, locked indoors and never allowed her to mingle with other children. She was even denied from knowing who her real mother was.
The prosecutor alleged that Bala, as he was called by the followers of his cult, used brutal and calculated manipulation to subjugate women for his sexual satisfaction, often using violence and sexual degradation to draw them towards his will.
The prosecutor also alleged that Comrade Bala tricked his believers saying that he could read their mind and that he had supernatural powers to control elements. When one of the captives gave birth to his daughter, he called her a collective property, not even allowing to breastfeed or cuddle her. The girl was called “comrade” as no name was assigned to her. She was denied education and was barely allowed to see the outside world till she escaped from his clutches after 30 long years of confinement in 2013.
The Southwark Crown Court in London was told by the prosecutor that the child was made to believe that if she attempted to escape from the facility, she would immediately burn to death.
Prosecutor Rosina Cottage QC, on the opening day of the trial, said to the jury that Balakrishnan tried to exalt his power upon the captives through violent means, which forced the women captives to live a fearful, isolated life all through these years.
They were made to believe that Balakrishnan could kill them with one touch on a pressure point in their neck and each waited for their turn to have sex with him “by appointment”.
Balakrishnan has denied all the charges leveled against him, including that of rape, indecent assault, child cruelty and false imprisonment. According to the eyewitness who were inside the courtroom, Balakrishnan hardly looked like a godly figure, but according to the case charged against him, he posed as a god and received the worship of many women whom he recruited to his Maoist cult.
Southwark Crown Court in London was told by the prosecutor that Balakrishnan was once a firebrand radical who formed a Maoist cult to overthrow the “fascist state”. He had the gift of the gab and was a staunch follower of the ideas of Mao Tse-tung, the founder of Communist China. His extempores attracted many followers to the cult called Worker’s Institute during the 1970s.
Many who joined the cult included students and workers, as it talked about the empowerment of the working class. Balakrishnan became the sole authority of the Maoist cult that believed in the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, a state in which the proletariat, or the working class, has control of political power.
But the popularity of the cult diminished by 1979 and only six followers, all women, were left as its followers, this includes Bala’s wife Chanda Pattni.
But Chandra was hospitalized because of a diabetic coma in 1979 and soon, the revolutionary group became Bala’s sex slaves as he started using them for sex and for spying on each other. “There was negative criticism and reporting if individuals were not following directives given by Bala,” said the prosecutor.
The prosecutor also added, “Over a period of time Bala said that he had to control people’s minds and scrub them clean of the bourgeois culture and lifestyle.”
The prosecutor said, “They had all been dominated and brainwashed to the extent that they believed that he was all-powerful and all-seeing. If any of them were to go against him they would die and even if they were to have a bad thought about him they would die, fall ill or something bad would befall.”
The prosecutor also revealed a shocking story of one of the captives who fell pregnant. As she started showing physical signs of pregnancy, Balakrishnan allegedly told her that she was allowing the bourgeoisie to attack her and of having gas in her stomach.” When she gave birth in 1983, Balakrishnan called the baby the result of electronic warfare.
Another captive who was regularly beaten up by Balakrishnan didn’t even know the depth of her wound as there was no mirror in the house.
The captives were asked to form a semi-circle around Balakrishnan and were forced to stand for four continuous hours listening to him lecturing, criticizing and beating up others, the prosecutor alleged.
When she gave birth in 1983 “the defendant insisted that the baby was the result of electronic warfare”, the prosecutor said.
The existence of the child was kept as a secret and not until the death of her mother did the child knew that she ever existed among the captives.
The child started talking to taps and the toilet to get rid of her seclusion. She was often seen staring at children who played outside.
“It doesn’t have to be by lock and key. It doesn’t have to be chained up. Over time, the psychological and mental control was so strong over her that she could not exercise any independent choice at all,” the prosecutor said.
Balakrishnan was termed as a “Jekyll and Hyde character.”
“When he was nice he could be very nice, but when he was not he was frightening. She was meant to worship the defendant as God, so everything had to be through him. He would say himself that ‘he is nature and nature is him’ so that everything was controlled by him from the sun, the moon, all the winds, and the fires,” the prosecutor said.
Balakrishnan, along with his wife Chanda Pattni, was arrested by the Metropolitan Police after three women were rescued from their residence on October 2013 after one of them gave a tip off to an organization called Freedom Charity saying that she’d been held unwillingly for more than 30 years. All the three rescued from the captivity of Balakrishnan are now safe.
A former friend of Balakrishnan who lives in Singapore was quoted by The Times of India saying “He was born in Kerala and his father was a native of Kollam. He came to Singapore while young along with his father, who was a clerk at the British Naval Base. He completed his bachelor’s degree in Singapore and later joined the London School of Economics (LSE), but did not complete his course there.”