Anil David / Agape Connecting People

He stole S$900,000. His wife named the company "unconditional love" anyway.

I keep coming back to this story. Not because of what Anil David did. Because of what his wife did after.

He stole close to S$900,000. Not once. Three times.

First time, 1995. Took almost S$100,000 from clients as an insurance agent. Five years in jail. Second time, criminal breach of trust. Sixteen months. Third time, 2004. Colluded with his girlfriend to embezzle S$800,000 from a company. Eight years in maximum-security prison.

His wife Gita had two young daughters at home. She wanted nothing to do with him.

Here's what I can't stop thinking about.

During that third sentence, Anil got assigned to work in a call centre inside prison. Mundane stuff. But something shifted. He watched inmates sit up straighter when they had a purpose. Dignity through work.

He decided: when I get out, I'm building a call centre that hires people like me.

He got out. And Gita took him back.

Think about that for a second. Her husband stole from clients, went to prison, stole again, went back to prison, then stole a third time while cheating on her. And she opened the door.

About a year later, they founded a company together. Called it Agape. Greek for "unconditional love."

Anil said: "I chose the name Agape because of the unconditional love of my wife and daughters."

Not exactly the origin story you'd put on a pitch deck.

Agape Connecting People is a real contact centre. 150 staff across four locations. Half are currently serving prison sentences, running call centres inside Changi Women's Prison and the men's facility. The rest are ex-offenders, single mothers, seniors, persons with disabilities.

When COVID hit, the government gave them the National Care Hotline. Anil's team mobilised in ten days. He and Gita rallied to support foreign workers with hundreds of thousands of meals.

In October 2020, he received the President's Volunteerism and Philanthropy Award. The same government that locked him up three times gave him one of its highest honours for giving back.

He called Gita "the true recipient."

Here's what stays with me:

Anil's story isn't about redemption. It's about the person who chose to believe in you when the evidence said they shouldn't. Gita wanted nothing to do with him. Then she co-founded a company named "unconditional love" with the man who betrayed her.

Nearly 600 lives turned around because one woman decided the name on the door mattered more than the name on the rap sheet.

Who's the person who believed in you before you earned it?