The Story of Bentong Kali: Crime and Society in 90s Kuala Lumpur

by Suganthi Suparmaniam

The Story of Bentong Kali details the rise and fall of one of Malaysia’s most notorious gangsters Kalimuthu a/l Pakirisamy, better known as Bentong Kali, who terrorised the nation in the early 1990s. On the front of every newspaper, he was believed to be behind at least 16 murders and attempted murders before being killed by police in a double-storey house in Medan Damansara alongside two of his accomplices S. Gunalan aka Billiard and T. Gunasegaran aka Raub Guna.

Written by journalist Suganthi Suparmaniam, The Story of Bentong Kali traces Kalimuthu’s journey from his poor childhood in Bentong, Pahang to the streets of KL where he became involved in the drugs trade and protection work before forming his own gang and amassing around him a group of loyal followers. Based on first-hand interviews with former gang members, family members, police, including Tan Sri Zaman Khan, and journalists who covered the case, The Story of Bentong Kali gives an in depth account of the life of Kalimuthu and the events that led to a crime spree which captivated the nation. It tells the story not only of one gangster but also of a rapidly developing society coming to terms with problems of crime, drugs and economic insecurity.

Author

Suganthi Suparmaniam is a former journalist with the New Straits Times and has worked as an online editor with Astro Awani before venturing full time into writing. She is fascinated by Hindu mythologies, thrillers and crime stories. She lives with her family in Petaling Jaya.

170 pages, Paperback

Published August 23, 2019

Reviews

[Syed Shahrom Wafa · Rating 4 out of 5]

James 'Whitey' Bulger, John Dillinger and Ron Kray; from the movie Black Mass (2015), Public Enemies (2009) and Legend (2015) respectively. This 3 real life criminals that has been made into movies comes to my mind once I finished reading this book about Bentong Kali.

Like all those characters, they're cold-blooded, hot-tempered and bold. That's what Kalimuthu, aka Bentong Kali really is. If you live in the 1990s era you must heard or read this name at least once during that time. A real monster.

To his relatives & underlings, he is a generous man. Love to help the poor and the unfortunate one. He also had the habit to buy you food if he knows you're hungry. He is also the man you'll be looking for when you need some help. A man who true to his words. A reliable man.

But to some, he is just a murderer who happened to be responsible for some innocent killings. The Punjabi family in Rawang restaurant came to mind. Or that unfortunate group at another restaurant in Petaling Street. Or that poor man at the bus stop. Your life can't be guaranteed if you happen to be at the wrong place on the wrong time when he is nearby. He is just that dangerous.

But like all real life criminals, you can learn something from them. His childhood & upbringing stories really had some major factors that had shaped what he has been later in his extravagant's life.

Take some lessons from the good things he did. But of course more importantly, bare in mind the bad one.

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

SUGANTHI SUPARMANIAM - THE STORY OF BENTONG KALI 6.5/10

This writer is no author, it feels like a logbook of Kalimuthu's incidents without delving into the details, just rehashed killing stories each chapter without a strong backstory. It got mundane but thankfully it was only 170 pages, certainly not worthy of a movie adaptation, although I'm sure with the number of existing Tamil gangster movies, it was more Kali following the footsteps of Kollywood.

During my college years in Stamford, I remember some of my college friends who foamed at the mouth trying to associate themselves with Old Klang Road Asok (one of Kali's partners), glorifying him just because he lived around the neighborhood. I only just realized Asok's link to Bentong Kali from this book, a partnership but soured in the end. 

It was pitiful, the estate Indian gangster syndrome. Asok committed suicide (or so they say) by hanging himself at the KL arch at the Federal Highway in 2015.

It was comical how the writer transcribed Tan Sri Zaman Khan's experience with Kali, a police chief who claimed to be a top student. You can read in full glory of his words in this book through his laughable English, a reflection of the poor quality of Malaysian education even back in those days.

[Anita · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember this so vividly when it went down that day in 1993.

I got this book hoping to understand a little more about the man, but after I'd finished it I came away with the feeling that it was an injustice to write it simply for the sake of putting something out.

It lacked a stay factor. It was repetitive using extra words to retell an overtold line. In some instances the consistency was lost.

I felt for an ex journalist it lacked investigative writing, and after the ad verbatim ramble by Zaman Khan I was ready to throw the book away.

I continued only trying to believe some actual story could be puzzled together. And this is where it fails me.

Kali was gunned down because he was this notorious trigger happy gangster but the writer seems to allude that he merely was the owner of a gun used by one of his more trigger happy boys Billiard.

Whatever the real story or facts are, 1993 and the months before that night remain fresh in my mind 28years later.

[K · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author could have done better with a better editor—many grammatical errors could have been avoided. Nonetheless, this book deserves a praise for having put together a story long speculated amongst our communities. The man was many things. It was heartbreaking to even think how his mother must have felt when he couldn’t return home for the funeral or how the Indian community must have treated her knowing her son was prolific criminal. Kali was compassionate but misguided in so many ways. The drug epidemic hasn’t slowed down since his death either. The man lived by the gun and died by the gun. Truly a tragedy. I feel for his girlfriend the most. I wonder how she’s doing.

[Abbas Zubir · Rating 3 out of 5]

While it is an interesting read, and perhaps the first of this sort of local real life criminal 'life story' for me, I am a bit disappointed with the source of the story to be quite minimal. It is interesting read nonetheless, just a tad flimsy than what I was hoping for.

[Vinodh Menon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fast paced, well written, superbly arranged. Loved it!