I felt like an animal
Heartbreaking letter from the cult leader’s daughter ‘held captive for 30 years’
THE daughter of a Maoist cult leader who allegedly imprisoned her for 30 years wrote a heartbreaking letter to him expressing her pain at being ‘caged up like an animal’, a court heard yesterday.
Her letter to Aravindan Balakrishnan, 75, said there were ‘no words to describe the extreme hurt and anger’ she felt about the ‘totally inhumane way’ he had treated her.
She said she was threatened with torture and death if she disagreed with him during her captivity.
The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, wrote the letter in 2013 after escaping from the communist cult at a south London house where women were raped and sexually assaulted by her father, the jury heard.
The court was told yesterday how police allegedly missed an opportunity to save her eight years earlier when she fled to a police station and asked for help. Instead, officers persuaded her to call her father, who collected her and later allegedly slapped her for being a traitor.
When she escaped after 30 years of captivity, she had never been to school, played with friends or had a bank account or house key, Southwark Crown Court was told.
The woman did not know Balakrishnan was her father until she left, instead calling him ‘Comrade Bala’, as the 5ft-tall communist was known to his followers.
In the letter to her father, she said he had chained her up ‘like a prisoner, controlling every aspect of my life and controlling everything for me with absolutely no regards for my feelings’. She wrote: ‘I’ve been cursed, insulted, mocked, denigrated, excluded, beaten up, caged up like a wild animal, deprived of what really matters to me, presumed upon, imposed upon – the list is endless.’
She described how nothing changed after her first escape attempt in 2005.
‘I’m still treated in the same demeaning way,’ she said. ‘I’m sick to death of being held hostage by you lot. On top of all this, you expect me to worship you and promote you and go along with all your sick fantasies – well not any more!’
She finished the letter by telling her father she had changed her name because she wanted nothing to do with her ‘old life of abuse’, concluding: ‘I may have no wealth, no property, no position, no prestige. But I do have my dignity and I’ll defend it with my life.’
During her time in the cult, she wrote a poem about her miserable existence called The Shadow Woman. One line read: ‘I am alive (or so ’tis said) but maybe I’m meant to be dead. I am the shadow woman.’
After escaping she was treated in hospital before being placed with a foster family.
Prosecutor Rosina Cottage QC said: ‘She had a complete lack of practical skills and social awareness when she came to live with them.
‘When she first arrived, [she] had no idea how to cross the road or even be aware of traffic, nor could she navigate public transport.
‘She had no concept of money and purchasing as she had never been given any responsibility for money. She was terrified of electricity and would avoid using electrical items that had a plug. She did not know how to prepare food.’
Miss Cottage added: ‘Over time her skills improved but she is still emotionally ill-equipped for an independent life.’
Earlier, the court was told Balakrishnan threatened his daughter with death after she revealed she had a crush on former Labour MP Ken Livingstone.
Her mother was Sian Davies, one of her father’s followers, but she was not told this until after Miss Davies died in 1997, the jury heard.
Balakrishnan denies seven counts of indecent assault, four of rape, three of actual bodily harm, one of cruelty to a child under 16 and one of false imprisonment.
The trial continues.
‘You expect me to worship you’