Tamil pastor shares his story at CanTYD.
Convicted murderer and current pastor at the Tamil Church of the Living Saviour Kesavan Balasingham attends the Canadian Tamil Youth Development Centre's Awards of Excellence Sunday night at the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Toronto as the keynote speaker.
Staff photo/MIKE ADLER
His anger was uncontrollable.
Kesavan Balasingham was 19 and part of a gang, or something close enough to one, a group of Tamil youths who came together to "show ourselves strong."
They meant to protect each other, he said, but soon were fighting other young Tamils.
"We sort of turned against each other for no good reason."
When Balasingham's best friend was brutally beaten, his group "decided we were going to do something about this," he recalled. "Revenge was the theme of discussion."
A week later, in June 1999, Balasingham and his friends were out looking for their enemies.
On Ellesmere Road, they exchanged gunfire.
"Multiple vehicles, multiple guns; I myself got shot. In fact, that day I should have died. I should have been killed myself," Balasingham told an audience of 300 at a Canadian Tamil Youth Development Centre (CanTYD) event Sunday.
Dead was Nishavathal Sundaralingam, age 24.
It was two weeks before police arrested Balasingham, who knew he was guilty of killing another human being and of "hurting my own community."
"To this day they haven't arrested the individual directly responsible" for Sundaralingam's death, Balasingham said during his address at the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Toronto, but added, "I was part of it."
Awaiting trial at the Toronto East Detention Centre, Balasingham, "going crazy," was handed a Bible. He had mocked people who talked about God or religion, he said, but he felt calm as he read it.
"I wanted to experience forgiveness. I want not to have hate anymore," Balasingham said, remembering before his 20th birthday he dedicated his life to God.
"I felt 100 pounds lighter."
He was, however, convicted of second-degree murder and sent to Kingston Penitentiary at age 21. There, he wanted to die, but decided to live, "to declare the words of the Lord."
Balasingham trained as a counsellor in prison and was allowed to counsel other inmates. Three years ago, after nine years and two months of custody, he was paroled, and though it was "very foreign" to his family, he enrolled the next day in North York's Tyndale University College and Seminary.
He's now married, a father and pastor for The Tamil Church of the Living Saviour in Scarborough. "None of us are called to waste our lives," he said.
CanTYD started in 1999 as a community response to gang violence. It gives youth mentors, role models and peaceful ways to express themselves.
Balasingham said his own "inner struggles" began with difficulties in learning English, his fourth language, at age 10. "You're frustrated with your inability to perhaps be good at anything."
Then there was "the agony of living within two cultures," he recalled. "There's a culture at home that our parents know and then there's a culture in school and in the community with your friends."
Performances on stage Sunday between presentations of various CanTYD Awards of Excellence suggested struggles with personal demons, and the gap between generations continue in Greater Toronto's Tamil community.
Niroesan Manochandran dedicated one spoken word piece to two friends, both victims of gang violence, and another to CanTYD, which helped him shift his focus from "the thug life" he said which would have led to his own death or incarceration.
Members of Medai Konal - or "crooked stage," a drop-in program encouraging students to express themselves through dance or drama - portrayed a university student who is thrown out of the family home after coming out as a lesbian to her uncomprehending, and then furious, Tamil parents.
Another sketch centred on a high school student so bullied and overworked he is ready to try suicide.
Steevan Sritharan, who received his "most improved" award from Balasingham's hands, said volunteering with CanTYD helped him figure out who he was and got him to see beyond "my little bubble" in high school.
Sritharan stayed at R.H. King Academy an extra year to decide what he wanted to do, and got his marks up 20 per cent. "I think it allowed me to realize some things and grow up a bit," he said.