What Position Should the Indian Voters of Bagan Pinang Take?
We must get all the Indian voters to abstain from voting this time in Bagan Pinang. Both BN and PR are no good for us up to now. Let PR suffer as a result of this. We will make a difference with our votes. If PR continues to ignore the significance of this point let them pay a price.
Subramaniam Bharathy
A thought provoking article by Subramaniam Bharathy:
I offer these thoughts on how we can help ourselves. Please think about it and if you agree then let us start with Bagan Pinang.
Indians have not got what they wanted with their votes after the last General Elections.
The marginalization continues apace in the 4 states of PR. Umno continues with its racial and religious antics. The many faceted grievances of the Indians in the country see no light of day. In Penang we have got this lying DAP Chief Minister and a bunch of Indian Mandores in DAP and a string of broken promises by DAP. DAP washed its hands off a key Indian issue at Kampung Buah Pala. In PKR we have a bunch of wimps for MPs and Aduns. They are nowhere to be seen on Indian issues. In Perak and Selangor there has been significant land allocations to the Chinese by the Pakatan Rakyat Government but none whatsoever for the Indians. Temple demolitions go on in all the PR States. UMNO’s Hishamuddin the Home Minister says it is alright to slight the Indians in the country by desecrating their religious symbol, the cow. The Federal Government has done nothing on the Indian issues using the PR Government in the 4 States as their cover to continue to marginalize the Indians with their unchanging racist policies.
Why does all of this continue?
PKR, DAP, MIC, UMNO, just want our votes – that’s all.
Then they only return crumbs, like some minor funding for the schools or some small piece of land for the schools or some such token after the elections because they have to be seen to be doing something. They allow the problems that cause marginalization to persist. They all reckon we are not significant enough to matter for more than that. That’s it they, BN and PR reckon we are not significant enough to matter for more than that.
This is totally unacceptable. What we need is a holistic approach to the Indian issues in the country. This is our demand to both PR and BN. Then maybe we can consider other things, but bread and butter issues first.
Look at the crime rates, the suicide rates, the alcoholism , the drug abuse situation, the unemployment rate, the limited opportunities for Indian businessmen and the drying up of educational and training opportunities in government institutes and public universities for Indians. The BN government and the PR governments are not taking us seriously enough to approach the problem in this holistic way. The 18 point memorandum of Hindraf clearly lays out what the Indians seek. They are not doing anything about the issues as we have raised them.
The only option we have now is to hit them where it will hurt so they will begin to sit up and take note.We must use our votes wisely to get them to reckon that we are significant enough in their political calculations.
