Vishnampettai J. Balachandran

V. J. Balachandran or Bala, as he was known by family and friends, died on January 17, 2021 after a long struggle with heart disease, which took a significant turn for the worse in the latter half of 2020. He fought bravely and determinedly against the failures of his heart, living much longer than any of us would have expected and giving us all the gift of his good humor and insights. Bala was born in pre-independent India in 1942 in Nagpur. Tamil by birth, he yet spent most of his life in North India, mostly in Calcutta. As a result, he was fluent in English, Tamil, Hindi and Bengali along with significant proficiency in Sanskrit, and other languages. The eldest son in a family of nine, with six sisters, Bala was thrust into the role of a caregiver from a very young age, as his own mother was disabled and quite young when she became the head of a large household. An expert at negotiating the markets of Calcutta for whatever the family needed, Bala was also adept at braiding hair, a talent he put to good use with his two grand-daughters! As was customary at the time, Bala played a leading role in his sisters’ marriages, providing both emotional and financial support. With a clear sense of right and wrong, Bala wasn’t afraid to take a stand, even if it put him in conflict with his parochial surroundings. He dressed the Muslim servant as a Hindu during some of the more serious Hindu-Muslim riots in Calcutta and with significant risk to himself, whisked him away to safety. While deeply religious and committed to the Hindu beliefs and practices he was raised with, he never gave way to narrow-minded concerns of community over principle. A sampling of books from his library which included the Quran, as well as Buddhist meditational texts, reveals not only how wide ranging his reading and interests were, but also how open-minded he was. Insatiably curious, Bala always wanted to explore and see the world around him. His family remembers fondly the trips they took together to Mount Rushmore, Colorado, Florida, Boston, Alaska, among other places. He also took several trips to Panama and Europe with his wife, Uma. A proud father—he loved telling anyone who would listen that his daughter was a doctor, his son a PhD professor in Engineering and another son who was a lawyer—he was even a prouder grandfather, taking care of his five grandkids, who could always manage to bring a smile to his face. Bala’s death leaves a hole in the lives of his family. He is survived by his wife of 52 years, Uma, his children, Padma, Sivaram and Gopal, his son-in-law Subramanian, his daughter-in-law Jyoti and his five grandkids, Anand, Maya, Asha, Nakula and Nikhil. A Live Stream Webcast will begin at 3:00pm on January 21, 2021. Please click on the Tribute Wall Tab and then click on the Live Stream Tab to view the the Live Stream Webcast or use the link: https://client.tribucast.com/tcid/29142137