Major events of this
period
Sivadas s/o Sankaran, 82, is a retiree. He was a journalist with The Straits Times from 1947 to 1951. He became a sub-editor with the same paper after that and stayed with ST till 1971.
The Communists were active in the late 1940s and early 1950s. They were everywhere, and I had personal experience with them while working as a reporter.
For instance, one day, I was asked to cover a meeting in a shophouse at Robinson Road. It was a Chinese meeting, everything was in Chinese, so I didn't understand what was being said or what was happening.
Suddenly, everybody stood up, and because everyone was standing up, I also stood up. A photographer took a picture which showed me standing up with the rest. That picture was published in the Singapore Free Press, an afternoon paper.
Some time later, I met a police officer from the Special Branch at a social function. He asked me why I was at a Communist meeting. 'Are you a Communist, why did you stand up', he asked. I said I had been asked to cover the meeting, I didn't know it was a Communist meeting! And since everybody was standing up, I too stood up, because I didn't know what was going on. They must have suspected me to be a communist!
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