Sanjaya Malakar

American Idol Finalist Sanjaya Malakar: A Secret Heartache?

Sanjaya Malakar is still hanging around on American Idol. Unless you are an eleven year old crying girl you likely wish he would just go away as he stumbles and mumbles his way through the joke that is now referred to as American Idol. But no one wishes Sanjaya harm, or heartache and reportedly the young man has had his share. A report from Star Magazine details a very private struggle for the Idol wannabe and his family.

Star reports: Sanjaya Malakar's off-key performances have been rudely labeled "very weak and a little weird" by Simon Cowell, snidely mocked on Saturday Night Live, and even made the subject of a barrage of ridicule from shock jock Howard Stern!

And that's not to mention the ribbing the 17-year-old singer's taken for his ever-changing, occasionally rooster-like hairdos! But given that the Washington state native had already lived through his parents' divorce and near-poverty during his early childhood, his toughness in the face of all that criticism shouldn't come as a surprise.

The magazine looks into his history and reports that Sanjaya's world fell apart in October of 1992, when he was just 3 years old - and his sister Shyamali, another Idol contestant, was 5 - after his father, Vasudeva Malakar, 44, filed for divorce from their mother, Jillian Recchi, 41. According to documents obtained by Star from Snohomish County (Wash.) Superior Court, the parents, who had separated a year before the divorce filing, were followers of the Hare Krishna movement.

When the divorce was filed, the family had almost no money coming in. Jill and the children were living in a Seattle apartment, and her only income was $531 a month from welfare. Dad Vasudeva, meanwhile, listed his yearly income as zero, and the couple's home in a northern Seattle suburb was up for sale. Star has more in this week's issue.

But thanks to American idol both he and his sister now have the opportunity to make careers where none existed before.