My name is Gana

This is about the time I won a case against the now legendary lawyer, Karpal Singh.  A workman filed a claim for workmen’s compensation for injuries sustained at work, under the Workmen’s Compensation Act, which was the forerunner of our current SOCSO laws. The employer, an Indian Contractor, engaged Karpal Singh to represent him. I was appointed as a Workmen’s Compensation Commissioner by my cheeky boss, who wondered how I would extricate myself out of this scene.  As a Workmen’s Compensation Commissioner, I had the powers to represent workers in the High Court. On the date of the hearing, both Karpal and I were in the judge's chambers, to present our cases. I told the judge the accident happened in the course and out of his employment and fell within the meaning of "accident" in the Act. Karpal understandably was not familiar with the Workmen’s Compensation Act and argued that his client conceded that the accident occurred in the course of his employment, but argued tha...

 My paternal grandfather moved from India to Africa, and thereafter to the then Malaya.  In the process my father lost contact with two of his siblings. Ava (my mother) and I have not seen them. I did inquire my dad all he could remember was they are still in then Malaya, they were Telugu teachers teaching in a Telugu School in Sitiawan a small town in Perak. I believe their offspring are in Malaysia happily speaking Telugu and are not aware they have distant cousins who can't speak the Telugu dialect. This is what happens when we migrate forgetting our roots. My mother could speak a smattering of Telugu which she she only spoke when she quarreled with my dad. My dad and his mum spoke Telugu well as well as Tamil. They switched over to Telugu when they did not want my mum to know what they were speaking.  My maternal grandmother is also Telugu hailing from Pondicherry India. Unlike the Indians who came into Malaya as estate laborers both my grandparents migrated to the to...