For folks who study immigration flows, one of the interesting phenomena has been the tremendous success of the Overseas Chinese. In just about any country with a significant Chinese population, we find substantial overrrepresentation of Chinese folks at or near the top of the income distribution. Interestingly, this is the case even in countries where the Chinese were subject to both historical and on-going discrimination. Nevertheless, their ability to swim these currents results in interesting theoretical debates about “why”, what it means for other minorities and poses significant real world problems. Amy Chua’s groundbreaking book World on Fire does a great job of diving into these issues and extending Thomas Sowell’s scholarship in understanding the ebb and flow of different minorities in the economy.
In contrast to the Chinese diaspora, the Desi diaspora has a far wider distribution of socio-economic outcomes. While Sepia Mutiny regularly catalogs success stories in the US and occasionally across the pond in the UK, the Desi diaspora is unique relative to many in the world in that we can find different countries where “Desi” invokes different stereotypes at every rung of the ladder. At one extreme, in Fiji and parts of Africa for example, Desis are/were practically viewed as nouveau colonial overlords who unfairly “control” a disproportionate share of the national economy much like the ethnic Chinese in the Phillipines.
In the US and much of the West, a milder range of stereotypes encompass wealthy, hardworking professionals (docs, techies), and entrepreneurs large (silicon valley), medium (shop keepers & hotels) and small (taxis!). That’s not to say there aren’t exceptions — Urban centers in Canada are a particularly unique testament to the breadth of the Desi community in the West; I still remember the first time I realized that a significant chunk of the “gang problem” being discussed in a newscast I saw in Vancouver was desi / Punjabi street gangs… Some googling turns up this article, to give readers a taste. Desi gang-bangers are apparently pretty significant in the UK as well… BUT, at the end of the day, y’all know what I’m sayin’.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, there are several countries where Desis are decidedly clustered at the bottom — the low status & harsh treatment received by Desi laborers in the Mid East is often discussed here. On the news tab, prolific contributer “VenkiG” points us at an interesting article describing the plight of the desi population in Malaysia –
Malaysia’s Indians don’t send home dollars, don’t become CEOs of IT start-ups; they haven’t even produced a VS Naipaul. Consequently, in contrast to the dissertations on the NRI community in the United States, the formerly east African Indians in Britain and the Indian diaspora’s experience in the Caribbean, there is a paucity of even basic information on the ethnic Indians living off the Straits of Malacca. Consequently, in contrast to the dissertations on the NRI community in the United States, the formerly east African Indians in Britain and the Indian diaspora’s experience in the Caribbean, there is a paucity of even basic information on the ethnic Indians living off the Straits of Malacca.
…Malaysian Indians are predominantly uneducated; few are white collar professionals, fewer still own property. Drug addiction is a problem among the young. At the bottom of the heap, they do low-end jobs and run errands for ethnic Chinese crime syndicates.
The article goes into some detail on the various subgroups that make up the Indian population in Malaysia and how integral the group overall has been to Malaysian history. The author argues that Malaysia’s recent turn towards a Muslim-centered identity bodes even worse for this group and he advocates stronger ties between the Indian government and Kuala Lampur as one remedy…
For me, the article is yet another interesting datapoint about the controversial relationship between culture, race and economics…. And I certainly didn’t know that there were nearly as many desis in Malaysia as there are in the US….
Malaysia is considered a middle-income country with nominal per capita income of ~$6000. India is at the low end of the low-income countries with nominal per capita income of ~$800. The poverty rate in Malaysia is a very small fraction of the staggering 80% in India who qualify as the poorest of the poor.
Indians must live in a very strange upside-down imaginary world in which India is a ‘success story’ and Malaysia a ‘third-world country with a lot of poverty’!
Hey Bhumi, how about we strip you of some your rights here in America. According to your logic you shouldn’t be complaining and you’ll consider yourself lucky as long as you are better of than the Malays in Malaysia.
Krish,
Where are you getting this BS from? Actually I support giving squatters legal property rights to the land they occupy. In fact lots of rightwing intellectuals support this. Its called Waking Dead Capital:
http://members.forbes.com/forbes/2000/0515/6511098a.html
You know who in India is actually kicking poor people of their land at this very minute? Thats right the secularists, Communists and Marxists of Bengal!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nandigram_dispute
At this point you’re probably all confused.
I complain about double standards, temple destructions and ethnic cleansing of Hindus that is going on today. Lets not forget that thousands of Indians in India die every year due to religiously inspired terrorism. I’m not interested in “getting even” for historical injustices for Hindus. I want the ongoing injustices to end.
What is the relevance of this? People are people–the only legitimate reasons to discriminate against Indians in Malaysia would be (1) backward-looking justice, in which they’re being punished for past wrongs of their group (problematic, but might be OK–e.g., affirmative action for descendants of slaves in US) or (2) egalitarian (forward-looking) concerns about relative economic outcomes in Malaysia.
If Indian-derived groups are relatively poor in Malaysia, I don’t see any argument for (2), and I’m not aware of any historical argument for (1). So, screw bhumiputra and treat people like people.
That’s depressing, but thanks for the information, risible. Do you know where I can find this report online?
On this issue, I agree with rob (#104). A country has to be fair to all its citizens, or at least try to be, or heck, even pretend to try to be. If it is deliberately cheating a portion of its citizens, it better have damn good reasons for that. Vague arguments like ‘its good for Malaysia’ or ‘nativism is everywhere’ don’t cut it.
Dear Vinod,
As someone who reads Sepia Mutiny with interest but feels totally unqualified to comment most of the time, I’d like to add my 2c on this post since I do have some knowledge about this particular subject. While I can’t speak for ALL Chinese people, as someone who has put a portion of my professional career into studying the Chinese Diaspora and as a product of that same diaspora myself (4th gen, NZ Chinese on my Mum’s side, and 2nd on my Dad’s), I’d like to take qualified issue with your first paragraph. Despite what the boosters (everyone from Lee Kwan Yew down to libertarians and the self-made men easily found at any family reunion) say, the “Overseas Chinese” are not nearly as good candidates for “model minority” status as some people would like to think.
In Malaya, prior to the 1970s, significant numbers of Chinese were pretty poor. Who do you think was supporting the Communist Party and living in the tin mine camps? Not the haut bourgeoisie. In the United States, those who did not make it financially either went back to China, or lived on in the US as part of an impoverished bachelor society focussed in Chinatowns like San Francisco’s and New York’s. Most Chinese American families did not become anything close to middle class until after World War 2. Those with sons who had served in the US military benefited from the GI bill just as AJAs did, the others benefitted from changes in the laws which governed red-lining and from increased public tertiary education opportunities (another spin-off of the GI bill) to improve their lot.
Those Chinese families who did attain middle-class levels of education prior to the war often did so only partialy: generally sons were educated while daughters were not, and money was raised through exploiting the labor of women and children, a typical immigrant strategy but one that does not always translate well for non-immigrants.
The more recent waves of Chinese immigrants to the US are evenly divided between middle-class and wealthy immigrants who are relatively well-to-do and working class immigrants who are much much more constrained in terms of their chances to gain upward mobility than the generations of the Sixties. There are now second generation restaurant workers in LA, NY and SF, and life for working class immigrants particularly from the PRC is precarious. If you don’t believe me, check out the people who are working to unionize sweatshops, restaurants and garment factories. They can give you the low down far better than I can.
As Ron Takaki points out in his excellent summary history “Strangers From a Different Shore” the model minority myth does not hold for many segments of East Asian Americans. The role of boot-strapping as an ideology that masks structural advantages or favorable historical circumstances is well discussed by Karen Brodkin in her excellent monograph “How the Jews Became White Folks”.
The American Dream is great as a motivational speech or as folklore but it’s lousy as social analysis.
Chris,
Ron Takaki is DA MAN!
For People like Bhumi, I’d recommend the following, a vision of what inclusive histories can look like:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Different_Mirror:_A_History_of_Multicultural_America
A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America is a book by Ronald Takaki. It deals with the subject of minority perspectives of multicultural America, incorporating quotes, folk songs, letters, telegrams, and photographs into the text. It deals with, in roughly sequential order, Native Americans, African-Americans pre- and post-slavery era, Irish, Chicanos, Chinese, Japanese, Jews, and ties up the book with a current (for the time the book was written) summary of where minorities are now. Each chapter talks about the history of a different ethnic group, and covers over a period of time public attitudes towards the minority, public policy, laws for or against the minority, and attitude of the minority towards their situation. A theme going throughout the entire book is the ‘us against them’ attitude that the ruling structure has towards the minorities, from the fear of the “giddy multitude” in colonial times, to the Chinese Exclusion Act being created to ‘protect’ white labor, to the modern day accusations that “Hispanics […] tak[e] jobs away from “Americans”[1]
This debate seems to have turned somewhat ugly while I was otherwise occupied, so I sort of hesitate to participate now, but there are one or two things I really do want to comment on:
1) Others have already said this, but it gets said often enough elsewhere — including, frequently, by the Malaysian government itself — so I think it’s worth repeating that the argument “Indians in Malaysia have it better than Indians in India, so they shouldn’t complain” is foolish, irrelevant, and dangerous. Whether or not Indians in India have it worse is of no concern here — there’s not even a need to quote statistics. Malaysian Indians are MALAYSIAN citizens, and so there’s no need to compare them to citizens of other countries with whom they may or may not share some biological characteristics. I think the comparison to African-Americans is brilliantly apt — kudos to the person who thought of it (I’d look for the original comment but I’m pressed for time here). Think about how wrong it would be to say to African-Americans:
“You have it a whole lot better here than you would in Nigeria/Ghana/Zimbabwe/Malawi, so sit in the back of the bus and shut up, and oh, don’t complain if your master whips you once in a while, because at least you get fed regular meals — if you were in Africa you’d be starving.”
I think the example makes it clear that the living standards of a country’s citizens should only be held up against the living standards of other citizens of that same country.
2) Rob (#104) — I get your “People are people” point, but I do think that in the Malaysian context it is relevant that the Peranakan Chinese and Chitty Indians have been there longer than many who now call themselves “Bumiputera.” The reason it’s relevant is that the Malaysian government justifies the Bumiputera policy by claiming that the Bumiputera are the original, “native” population of the country — yet they refuse to grant the same rights to communities that were there centuries before recent “Bumiputera” immigrants from elsewhere in the Malay archipelago (and even from the Middle East).
Ironic… I am assuming that “Bumiputera” is nothing more than a slightly modified version of “Bhumiputra” which would otherwise translate from Sanskrit as “son of the earth/soil”. Yet this term is used to apply to Muslims in Malaysia. It is unfortunate that all the nations of East and Southeast Asia forget their own Indian roots and look down on anyone who is nationally/ethnically Indian.
“Europeans” were no more the original “native population” of America than Africans… in that sense the comparison is not apt. Also the bit about American “equality” in the founding of the country , the idea at least was there.
YES!, but based on the review linked in the post doesn’t seem to be what Thomas Sowell, ever advocated for the AfAm community.
very interesting discussion (despite the sometimes acerbic tone); I actually happen to think that the bumiputera policy (coming after they did after the 60s bloody riots) is what maintained social stability in Malaysia. As for all the nationalistic chest thumping (on all sides), don’t you guys think we are better off discussing things rationally (bumi’s comments are especially ludicrous). There is a place and time to discuss comparative development policies and outcomes rationally without waving the policy outcomes like male reproductive organs. For example, and to put things in perspective, the population of Malaysia is about 27 million, which is around the population of Mumbai and a few suburbs; so development problems multiply exponentially in the case of India. Malaysia has managed to substantially raise the living standards of a population the size of Mumbai in about 45 years, not a bad achievement, but again nothing compared to the task facing policy makers who wish to raise living standards in India.
Sigh (#111): you make a very good point about the relative population of Indian versus Malaysia and why the latter might have had more economic sucess — yet, as you say, there is a time and a place to discuss comparative development policies, and this isn’t one of them. The argument here is about how a government should be treating its own citizens — the ethnic origins of those citizens should be irrelevant. How well or how badly India is doing is all very interesting but should not be a part of this discussion.
As to:
Yes, and the apartheid policy is what maintained social stability in South Africa for a long time. What of it?
Two quick reactions: 1) I did not say that bumiputera policy is/was “moral”, just that it prevented serious social strife (to be fair I am aware of good arguments against this assertion too). So my statement was not meant to convey any moral position, but was meant to clarify the difficult political situation in Malaysia in the late 1960s;
2) I don’t quite agree with your apartheid analogy (again this is not a moral disagreement; I agree that its really difficult to justify bumiputera policies morally). The point is that apartheid did not lead to social stability; in fact it was a social disaster waiting to happen, precisely because it was aimed at the majority of the people, not a relatively small minority. Again this does not mean that one was morally better than the other, thats another question altogether.
All five leaders of HINDRAF have been arrested under Malaysia’s hyper-draconian National Security Act. link.
The Malaysian Foreign Minister brushed off the Congress-appointed US Commission on Religious Freedom’s protest (spearheaded by Indian-American lawyer Preeta Bansal). link
Yes, and the apartheid policy is what maintained social stability in South Africa for a long time. What of it?
I think the anology is quite apt
Sigh (#113):
Of course I’m not judging your moral position! I can’t claim even to know your moral position from one comment — I’m sorry if it came across that way. I was merely disagreeing with the implication, in that one comment, that the Bumiputera policy had been worth it for Malaysia — that it was a fair price to pay for social stability (and actually, I also happen to think that Malaysia’s “social stability” owes itself primarily to the Government’s draconian laws — to the Internal Security Act and the Sedition Act. I mean, look at what they’ve done to the leaders of the HINDRAF protest. If you throw people in jail without trial for speaking out against the government, why yes, you’re likely to end up with a “stable” society).
And about this:
I often hear this argument against calling the Malaysian situation apartheid: White South Africans were the minority while Bumiputeras are the majority; therefore the Bumiputera laws are not a form of apartheid.
White Americans are the majority in the US: so were the Jim Crow laws in the US not a form of apartheid?
Risible (114): Thanks for your support re: the analogy. I’m actually on a mini-crusade to get people to use the word apartheid to refer to the Malaysian situation. I’m trying to get an article published to this effect, but I’m not all that optimistic about getting the rest of the world to pay attention. I’m not sensing a whole lot of international interest in the Malaysian situation, and I’m not sure how to change that. I don’t even intend that as a criticism — there’s a lot of horrendous stuff going on in the world.
Firstly, as a fellow Malaysian, I do want to correct brownelf’s post #61. This post claims that “the Bumiputera policy doesn’t benefit many of Malaysia’s indigenous people, who don’t qualify as Bumiputera under the government’s definition”. This is inaccurate. What you are describing is definition of Malay vs. definition of Bumiputra:
Definition of Malay according to article 161 of the constitution: Defines a Malay as a Malaysian citizen born to a Malaysian citizen who professes to be a Muslim, habitually speaks the Malay language, adheres to Malay customs, and is domiciled in Malaysia or Singapore.
Definition of Bumiputra: Peninsular Malaysia “If one of the parents is Muslim Malay or Orang Asli as stated in Article 160 (2) Federal Constitution of Malaysia; thus the child is considered as a Bumiputra” Sabah “If a father is a Muslim Malay or indigenous native of Sabah as stated in Article 160A (6)(a) Federal Constitution of Malaysia; thus his child is considered as a Bumiputra” Sarawak “If both of the parent are indigenous native of Sarawak as stated in Article 160A (6)(b) Federal Constitution of Malaysia; thus their child is considered as a Bumiputra”
So the indigenuous ppl who are not Muslim, are considered Bumiputra still. No idea why the difference in Sabah vs. Sarawak (East Malaysia) definition. But there are plenty of non-Muslim, Christian, or Animist Bumiputras. Orang Asli (literally orignal people) are the indigenous ppl of peninsular Malaysia.
The reason for the very existence of the definition of Malay is due to the fact that there really isn’t a real “Malay” race — particularly in Malaysia due to intermarriage with Indian, Chinese, Thais, Arabs etc. There many very different looking Malays. As noted Mahathir Mohammad is of Keralite specifically Malbari ancestry. Before him, the prime minister was Hussein Onn who was 1/4 Turkish. Before him was Abdul Razak Hussein of Bugis (originally from Indonesia) — he was also Hussein Onn’s brother in-law. And the first prime minister was Tunku Abdul Rahman whose father was Sultan of the state of Kedah and whose mother was daughter of a Thai nobleman. All of these prime ministers are considered Malay. So you see, there is no real “Malay” when it comes to race. Only religion (Muslim), mother language (Malay) and customs (Malay – very influenced by Indian and Chinese traditions) matter.
That said no doubt the Malaysian Indian is at the bottom of the pile. This doesn’t mean that apartheid is practised in Malaysia. When I went to school in Malaysia many Malaysian Indians could barely speak Malay. Even more children of estate workers or rubber tappers were sent to Tamil medium school instead of “National” type Malay medium schools. Malaysian Chinese also go to Chinese medium schools, but the major difference is that Chinese medium schools have far better quality of education. I believe this is because of community investment. Tamil medium schools are poorly funded because they only have basic govt. funding and dont have support from the Tamil speaking community locally (due to low income levels). They get stuck in a cycle. On top of that if you have poor Malay language capability its hard to get job anywhere else. Malaysian Indian being on about 8% of the pop means its pretty tough to find a business that will accept person who cant speak Malay well.
Note that estate Malaysian Indian are segragrated not by force. The British separated us all: Malays in the villages being fishermen and farmers, Chinese running businesses in the cities and working in mines, Indians/Tamils working rubber estates and mostly Sri Lankan Tamils holding white collar jobs with the British administration.
And please. No ethnic cleansing going on either. My parents have plenty of Malaysian Indian neighbors as well as Malays and Malaysian Chinese neighbors. About expanding and fixing temples – the one in front of my parents housing complex has doubled in the last 5 years and its right across the street from a mosque.
Finally I do want to point out that there are shopkeepers selling Indian grocery goods from India, restaurant cooks from India and my parents newspaper man is from India. These guys make truck loads of $$ and live a very good life in Malaysia. They make enough money to go home with gifts for their families in India every year. And our old newspaper man retired to India. My parents family doctor is Malaysian Indian as is my father’s attorney. Loads of lawyers and doctors in Malaysia are Malaysian Indians. So there are plenty of well educated and well off Malaysia Indian as well as solid Indian citizens in Malaysia.
The big problem is the special status accorded to Bumi and Malays. Therefore, there are no special policies to help Malaysian Indians. So the cycle of poverty is repeated over and over again. Just like in the US African American population. Same problem.
Now there have been temple demolitions. According to the govt. the temples were illegally constructed and thus have to demolished. However, some of these temples have been around for a long time. At least one was 60+ years old. There was also at least one temple that was demolished 2 years after a notice was served. However, the ppl were not given a chance to relocate the temple.
Unfortunately Malaysian politics is race driven. If Malaysian Indians want to move forward, first they need to do remove Samy Vellu from his position in MIC (Malaysian Indian Congress) and have someone else represent the Malaysian Indian community. They need to have someone to represent them from within the system. Illegal gatherings and sending please to Queen Elizabeth doesnt work in Malaysia. So now Hindraf actions have fractioned the Malaysian Indian society and there is a lot of polarization between races/religions.
Its a tough situation.
AnakM:
Yes, I’ve read the Wikipedia article too, thanks. But the reality is that Orang Asli from peninsular Malaysia do not count as Bumiputera unless they’re Muslim. Orang Asli from Sabah and Sarawak do — I’m also not sure why different rules apply that but I suspect that is because there is enough of a non-Muslim orang Asli majority in Sabah and Sarawak (e.g. the Kadazans, who hold a lot of the power within Sabah) that the government had to make that concession to entice Sabah and Sarawak into the federation in 1963.
Thanks also (AnakM) for pointing out that race is a social construction. That’s my point exactly — I’ve already posted about this here. It’s precisely because race is a social construction that governing a country according to “racial” criteria is an unsound idea.
As to vernacular schools existing by choice and not by force — I think the argument that racial segregation happens “by choice” is probably familiar enough to American audiences that I don’t have to take it apart here. Let me just say that rubber tappers on plantations don’t have a whole lot of choice about where to send their kids to school when the nearest national school is a hundred miles away.
Brownelf, I havent read your writings on race being a social construction, so we are on the same page. If you want to read the constitution its over here: http://www.malaysia-today.net/malaysia_constitution.pdf
There is actually no definition of Bumiputra explicitly in the constitution. The definition given in previous post #116 came from “Buku Panduan Kemasukan ke Institusi Pengajian Tinggi Awam, Program Pengajian Lepasan SPM/Setaraf Sesi Akademik 2007/2008” (Guidebook for entry into public higher learning institutions for SPM/equivalent graduates for academic year 2007/2008). As you know, we have a race based quota system for entry in public higher learning insitutions. So these things have to be precisely defined. I don’t know of any other written record of definition of Bumiputra. I dont know what data you have to back up your assertion that orang asli are not considered Bumiputra.
Malaysian Indian still do send their children to Tamil school even when there is a choice to send to National type school. In the housing area where my parents live, there are National type, Tamil and Mandarin schools. In fact, the Tamil school recently opened in the last 5 years. I just noticed it when I went home for vacation this year. I dont think the government would be opening Tamil public schools if the Malaysian Indian community was not asking for it.
If Malaysian Indians want a step up and get better teachers hence better education, they should give up Tamil vernacular schools and send their kids to National type schools. Then they should insist on Tamil language class during the period when Muslim students have religious studies instead of that silly Moral Studies BS. The govt. is indeed planning on offering electives in Mandarin and Tamil in National type schools. You can refer to the Education Blueprint 2006-2010 (Pelan Induk Pembangunan Pendidikan 2006-2010) – couldn’t find one online. Otherwise lobby for better teachers in Tamil schools. Its better to spend their energy on this than going around telling the world that there is ethnic cleansing against Malaysian Indians, or apartheid or suing Britain for citizenship and $4 trillion.
Language schools fashioned in the colonial/plantation era were intended to serve one purpose only: DIVIDE people, specifically to avoid collective action built across inter-ethnic lines.
This makes a great deal of sense. In our lifetime we have to strive to make serious inroads in this area. One of Lakshmi Mittal’s first acquisitions outside of India was a newly de-nationalized steel plant in Trinidad and Tobago. Indian entrepreneurship would be foolish to overlook the opportunities in places like Fiji, Uganda, South Africa, and the Carib. Ultimately, it will be Indian private sector engagement in these countries that will most benefit the local Indian populations quest to be treated as more than invisible.
We are not people who have ‘just discovered’ our Hindu-ness as MoorNam indicated. Most of you spit out ignorance like this and never question it. It’s rude and offensive. How would you like it if I said that ABCDs would throw out just every aspect of their culture to assimilate into upper-middle class white society in the US? Think a little before you speak.
The understanding of the Indian diaspora has to develop and expand just as the idea of “being Indian” is constantly being constantly reworked by the demands of a changing society.
I once saw some ZeeTV/Star/etc. travel show that did an episode on Fiji. What amazed me was that it was just like what we’d expect from an American travel show. They reduced Fiji to the natural beauty and completely left out the cultural element which you would think be of interest to 1 billion people just coming to understand their place in the global order? It’s one thing to be made invisible by Malaysian state policy and another thing altogether when you’re own people do it to you 🙁
AnakM: I think I should clarify what I’m saying about the Orang Asli. As you know, the word “Bumiputera” was invented for the New Economic Policy in 1970, so no, it doesn’t appear in the constitution. The constitution was written at a time when the main racialist concept was “Ketuanan Melayu” (Malay Supremacy). Article 153 therefore holds that the Malays, and the Malays only, have “special rights” that must be safeguarded by the King. The Bumiputera policy came later, and yes, the new word Bumiputera technically did include the Orang Asli, but the Orang Asli have not benefited from the Bumiputera laws because under the constitution they have no special rights. Their position is therefore complicated, but if you look at any research at all on the Orang Asli, you will see that they have not benefited from their Bumiputera status because they have no constitutional special rights; their Bumiputera status is nominal. If you want some hard facts/statistics, I suggest starting at the website of the Center for Orang Asli Concerns:
http://coac.org.my
You’ll see that despite their “Bumiputera” status, the Orang Asli fall behind both the Malays and the Chinese on all social indicators; also, the per capita area of Malay Reserve Land is three times as large as that of Orang Asli reserve land, with the figure for Orang Aslis falling rather than growing.
That’s what I meant when I said they didn’t count as Bumiputeras — if the excuse for the Bumiputera laws is that the Malays are the “natives” of the land (never mind that even the Peranakan Chinese and the Indian Chitties have been there longer than the ancestors of many of today’s Malays), why are the aboriginal peoples of peninsular Malaysia not benefitting from these laws?
As to the issue of vernacular education — the Tamil school in your area, AnakM, is anecdotal evidence. Of course some Indian parents send their kids to Tamil schools by “choice” (but anyone who has studied racial segregation in the US should know that “choice” is a complicated concept indeed when it comes to these things). My argument is just that most don’t have any choice, because most poor Indians still live on estates and in Indian villages, far away from national schools. If the government were really interested in integrated eduction they should, as you say, make all schools national schools (with optional language classes for all students), pump an equal amount of resources into all schools in all areas, and open the elite residential schools (e.g. the Malay College Kuala Kangsar and the MARA junior science colleges) to the very best students of all ethnicities. But what a wonderful world that would be.
As for this:
I don’t think it’s an either-or choice, AnakM. I may not agree with all of HINDRAF’s rhetoric, but I do agree that what this cause needs more than anything else right now is international attention. So I don’t think it’s a waste of energy to try to get that attention.
Brownelf, ideally the best situation would be to remove the special Bumiputera / Malay rights. But you and I know this wont happen, at least not in the short term. All Bumiputera are supposed to have the same rights but whether or not they actually get to exercise those rights is a different story. I do agree that Orang Asli in peninsular in particular are very poorly off despite their supposed special rights. They are probably even worse off than Malaysian Indians to be honest.
Access to proper education is lacking in many places. Its not a unique issue for Malaysian Indians. I think its an issue in remote areas in Malaysia, period. Even many Malay ppl fall in this bucket. I’ve been to plenty of kampung schools. I think the school issue is particularly obvious in the case of Malaysian Indians because of the large number of students stuck in poorly equipped schools (with poorly trained teachers) compared to the total Malaysian Indian student pop. Anyone know any statistics here?
Supposedly the Education Blueprint 2006-2010 is planning to offer Tamil & Mandarin electives as I mentioned — but lets see. We can believe it when we see it. Otherwise its just words on paper to make everyone feel good. What would be really nice is if we had a full period for true electives. Even Malay / Muslim students should be given the option to study Tamil or Mandarin instead of being shuttled off to Islamic classes. I dont think anyone is giving up Tamil or Mandarin schools for National type schools ONLY tho … even though its the right thing to do for the future of the country.
Re Hindraf, I think that if you want to be treated as an equal citizen of a country, you need to act like you actually want it. Suing for citizenship of another country just further alienates the Malaysian Indian community from the rest of the country. Spouting untrue claims simply discredits the word of the Malaysian Indian citizens when its proven to be lies. Things are bad enough already to bring to the attention of the rest of the world without trumping up the charges. No need to make it sound like Rwanda. Other than that, international attention and pressure is certainly a good catalyst to push for some change. Lets just do it with honestly.