The story of a nation is seen through the lives of its people. The Malaysian Insight speaks to citizens who were born in 1957 and are as old as Malaya’s independence. Their stories offer a glimpse of what being Malaysian means to them.

PENANG Hindu Association (PHA) deputy president P. Murugiah, 60, has spent a lifetime championing the cause of the poor and consumers, and has realised from the experience that the country is divided today because of politics, and not race.

He was the seventh child out of nine, and his father only earned a meagre income as a printing company foreman.

“His last pay was about $400. With 11 in the family, we struggled.” The currency then was the Malayan dollar, which became the ringgit in 1967.

Like other working-class families in the 1960s, they scraped through a decade when jobs were scarce and trade with Indonesia suffered because of the Confrontation with Malaysia from 1963 to 1966. In 1969, Penang lost its free-port status.

Penang had no Komtar building then, but the neighbourhood around his house on Jalan Datuk Keramat in George Town, across the road from what is now the Gama supermarket, was a bustling commercial area with roadside stalls, Indian coffee shops, bookstores, Chinese-run businesses and the old Wembley theatre.

Murugiah’s mother woke early to make thosai, which he and his siblings then delivered to Indian stalls and shops near their home.

“We all helped. Times were hard, and we often didn’t have enough to eat at home. 

“There were times we had nothing to cook and all we ate were the unsold thosai returned by the stalls and shops.”

Whenever he needed a pair of new shoes, his mother would tell him to save 20 cents every day for six months.

His most horrifying moment as a child was being helpless while one of his older brothers got beaten up by security forces for opening a window during curfew hours.

Murugiah thinks this might have happened in 1967 after the Penang hartal riot on November 24 over the devaluation of the Malayan dollar against the pound sterling and the newly established Malaysian dollar. The riot led to 17 deaths and 137 injured.

“I can’t remember why there was a curfew, but I remember seeing the military people on the streets. I was small and didn’t understand. But it was earlier than the May 13 (1969) racial riots.

“My brother didn’t know he couldn’t do that. They hit him with the butt of their rifles. Nobody could help him. My father kept us indoors. We just cried and screamed inside.”

Despite their struggles, Murugiah said he and his siblings finished school but most did not have the chance to further their studies. Two of his older sisters excelled at school. One became a teacher while the other studied medicine in India but could not finish because of an ear infection.

Murugiah’s father found him his first job at another printer with the hope that he would gain experience to start his own business.

“I was just a boy so I got bullied. It was tough working with hot iron and boiling water. I got burned all the time for a small monthly pay of $35.”

Murugiah landed his second job at the Consumers’ Association of Penang (CAP) through his father, who was a member. After that, he had to survive alone.

His father died when he was 17. His mother and siblings moved to Seremban but he refused to go.

“So, I found myself homeless at 18 or 19. I slept on the five-foot way for three nights before I stayed with friends.”

CAP paid Murugiah a monthly wage of $75 in the 1970s. The association also put him on a $100 bond to get a bicycle. His pay was deducted each month for the bicycle. 

To supplement his income, he worked on Sundays, washing cars. For food, he gate-crashed weddings. When he got caught, he washed the plates as penalty.

“When CAP had events, that was when I enjoyed good food. Life was hard. I often asked why God had tested me that way,” he said.

“I was young and not aware of (racial discrimination) issues. It was a fact that there were many poor people but there were not many government welfare programmes at the time. Many lived on the streets, too, as there were no welfare homes. 

“Things are better now, although we can improve our welfare programmes to help those in need.”

University of CAP

Murugiah said working for CAP taught him about the world, although his pay was little and he had to work from 7.30am to 9pm.

“I learned to write letters in English and press statements and to use the typewriter. One of my superiors funded my Saturday typing classes.

“I also learned about investigative work. I monitored the prices of goods at markets, and checked food outlets and food-processing factories for problems.

“CAP was my university,” he said, relating his many adventures and misadventures, as he produced front-page headline exposes for the CAP newspaper.

In the 1980s, Murugiah found dead animals in a water tank on the roof of a building at Penang Hospital, which supplied water to the kitchen. After documenting the find, he climbed down from the roof using a rope and was caught by a doctor.

“I knew security would take me to the medical superintendent, who would want my film. Luckily, I had a Plan B. 

“I told the guards my motorcycle was outside and I wanted to bring it inside since I might be long. They didn’t want to be responsible if I lost anything, so they allowed me.

“As I walked to my bike, I slipped the roll of negatives down my underwear. I gave the hospital an empty roll.”

Murugiah also wrote a press statement on the hospital mortuary’s poor condition with unclaimed bodies stacked on top on one another in the freezer.

“Space was limited so the bodies were pressed. The skin would come off when the bodies were removed. When the freezer broke down, all the bodies would be put outside.

“Within 24 hours of making the news, the Dewan Rakyat held an emergency sitting and approved funds for a cold room.”

Looking back, he said, he likely got some people, civil servants included, fired from their jobs.

In the late 1980s, Murugiah – married with children by then – needed life insurance but had no money to pay the RM50 monthly premium. 

His CAP research officer salary had improved but he still struggled to provide for his family.

The insurance agent offered to pay Murugiah’s monthly premium, if he could introduce him to a new client every month.

“I got him 10. Since I was good at it, he recruited me part-time. I realised that I could make my entire annual salary (at CAP) in just two or three months selling life insurance.

“CAP was reluctant to let me go. Each time the boss (CAP president S.M. Mohamed) Idris tore my resignation letters, he increased my pay by RM200.”

Murugiah eventually went into insurance full-time and made his fortune. He bought a house and car for his family, visited 25 countries, and sent his three children to private colleges. 

“My eldest son, 31, is an Abu Dhabi-based chief marine engineer. My second boy, 30, works in IT at AirAsia. My youngest girl, 25, just finished her studies in bio-food tech. 

“They all know I came from a hard life. My eldest son bought me my dream car, a Mercedes-Benz, a few years ago. He chose 1957 as the plate number for me.”

Politics, not race, that divides us

Murugiah has not forgotten his humble roots and this keeps him active in charity and social work, for both the living and the dead.

Through PHA and Klinik Derma Sivasanta, a free clinic run by the Temple of Fine Arts, he helps poor families with food aid, the sick with healthcare, and the unclaimed bodies with proper funerals. 

Murugiah quipped that he has become a “licensed beggar”, collecting donations for charity over the years.

“It was a blessing I met my master, the late (Hindu spiritualist and Temple of Fine Arts founder) Swami Shantanand Saraswathi in the late 1970s. If I didn’t, I might have gone into bad company and life might be different today.

“There was also CAP, which taught me about living a straight life. I saw so many cases of cheating while I worked there.”

His experience of being poor and struggling together with other families in his childhood has made him miss the “Muhibbah” (goodwill) spirit of those days.

Even though the people faced hardship then, there was goodwill, regardless of race and religion, he said, recalling how his family used to spend their weekends with a Malay fisherman’s family – playing together and eating from the same plates.

“Unity and togetherness were much stronger then. We were like the multiracial characters in P. Ramlee movies. We scolded each other but stayed friends.

“Now the unity is breaking up because of politics, not because we have different skin colours or faith. All religions teach us love and respect.

“The present generation of Malaysians should be better off in this age, but sadly many are leaving the country, worried that they have no future. 

“I have many friends saying they left or they are migrating overseas to places like Australia and other Western countries for the sake of their kids’ education and future. 

“There is much unhappiness and concern about Malaysia’s future. If we can bring unity back, we can make this country more successful and beautiful.” – September 6, 2017.