Kozhikode: “My feelings are mixed, to be honest. He was not the best dad as is well known but he is still my dad at the end of the day, and I’m sorry he passed away before there was a chance of making it,” said Katy Morgan-Davies, the daughter of Aravindan Balakrishnan, the notorious Kerala-born man, who ran a fanatic cult in London and was sentenced to 23 years in jail by a UK court for a series of sexual assaults in 2016. He died in jail on April 8.
Katy is currently pursuing philosophy and sociology at Leeds University, the UK.
In an exclusive interview to The New Indian Express over mail, Katy Morgan, now 39, who escaped from his 30-year-long chilling torture in 2013, disclosed that her father Aravindan Balakrishnan hailed from Mayyanad in Kollam.
“He was born in Mayyanad. He left for Singapore with his mother when he was 8, to meet his father who was a soldier there,” said Katy. Balakrishnan’s parents are R Balakrishnan and Sarojini and he had a younger brother, who is a consultant ENT surgeon in Singapore.
Comrade Bala’s father worked for the British army in Singapore. Katy said that she had no idea whether her father ever visited Kerala after he left the native place at the age of eight.
Katy’s mother is Sian Davies, a follower of Arvindan Balakrishnan, who was also tortured by Aravindan and died in 1997 after falling from upstairs under mysterious circumstances. Growing up in the cult, Katy was kept in the dark about her parents for years though she lived with the seven people of the cult, including Aravindan Balakrishnan, his wife Chanda and Sian Davies.