The rise of the Indians

The March 2008 General Elections and the run-up to it threw up many watershed moments and amongst the most memorable of them must surely be the Hindraf rally and the fall of Samy Vellu.
After decades of relative idleness, who would have thought that approximately 30,000 Indians would storm various parts of central Kuala Lumpur in an attempt to hand over a memorandum to the British High Commission?
"The crowd was unprecedented," said the very nervous MIC leader and Cameron Highlands MP SK Devamany during a phone interview with Al Jazeera.

It all started when P. Waytha Moorthy, a Hindraf lawyer, filed a class action suit at the British High Court against the UK government for US$4 trillion (US$1 million for every Malaysian Indian) for simply withdrawing from Malaysia after granting independence thus leaving the Indians unprotected and at the mercy of a majority Malay-Muslim government.
As the group could not afford the legal fees required, a petition was produced to be presented to Queen Elizabeth urging her to appoint a Queen's Counsel to argue the case. This petition carried with it 100,000 signatures of Malaysian Indians in support.
The purpose of the rally was to hand over this 100,000 signature heavy petition to the British Embassy in Kuala Lumpur.
It was not the contents of the petition that shocked the government. It was the sheer number of Indians that turned up which did.
Even before the sun had risen on that November morning, the Indians had gathered in defiance of the government's warning not to. Tear gas canisters shot into the crowd were thrown back at the police.
"We are here... we are coming here as a peaceful citizen, a Malaysian citizen to fight for our rights only," said one protestor.
Less than half a year after the Hindraf rally, MIC President Samy Vellu who did not support the rally lost his parliamentary seat.
This shocking result ended Samy Vellu's days as a cabinet minister. The heavyweight politician tried to hang on to power by remaining as MIC President but he could not reverse his unpopularity.
On December 6, 2010, Sammy Vellu retired as MIC President after three decades in power.
Many Indians rejoiced when they heard the news while opposition politicians and comedians openly wept.
No longer would there be any more faux pas from the seasoned politician.
The man had been the butt of jokes for years. Who can forget the one with Samy Vellu on the speed of Pos Laju's delivery system--Besok kirim, hari ini sampai!
Who can forget the one where Samy told villagers that he was going to build a bridge in their village? When informed that there was no need because the village had no river, he responded saying if no river, we shall build a river!
The March 2008 polls saw the Indian vote swinging decisively in favour of the DAP and Keadilan resulting in heavy losses not only for the MIC but also MCA and Gerakan, and to an extent Umno.
Suddenly, the Indians were no longer just an insignificant minority segment of the voting populace.
In many places they were the kingmakers and in terms of the national perspective, they played a huge role in what was later to be known as the 'political tsunami.'
So it was hardly surprising that the government began to take the Indians very seriously.
Towards the end of 2010, a book named Interlok authored by national laureate Abdullah Hussein was introduced into the Form Five literature syllabus.
Malaysian Indians were up in arms because the book referred to an Indian immigrant from the "pariah" caste.
The MIC hopped unto the bandwagon and demanded that the book be withdrawn on the grounds that the novel contained "offensive" words and depictions of Indian Malaysians.
The MIC claimed that the book will offend the entire Indian Hindu community, who, according to them, no longer practise the caste system.
Utusan Malaysia on the other hand ran a front page interview with Abdullah Hussein titled "Teardrops of a Laureate' where he said that the book needed to be read in light of the place and time it was set in.
The government was not willing sit by. The Indians were unhappy so something needed to be done.
Finally, an independent panel was set up to study possible amendments to the novel. This was doomed after three Indian representatives on the panel walked out after the panel was asked to water down its initial recommendation for 100 amendments to the novel to just one--the removal of the word 'pariah'.
A few weeks ago, the government finally decided to withdraw the novel from the Form Five syllabus.
There is no doubt that this decision was arrived at in the light of the importance of the Indian vote to the government especially given the fact that recent pre-election polling shows that the Indian support had returned to the Barisan Nasional.
The withdrawal of Interlok is just the tip of the iceberg.
In early 2010, Prime Minister Najib set up the Special Implementation Task Force (SITF) for Malaysian Indians to implement the decisions of the Cabinet Committee for the Development of the Indian Community chaired by him.
The SITF was created to monitor and strengthen delivery and implementation so that Indians from the poor and low income groups would be able to easily access public-sector services such as poverty eradication and affordable housing.
In July of this year, Najib launched the Indian community's theatre house Temple of Fine Arts' new RM20 million building which was the recipient of a RM3 million federal grant.
"The government is actively engaging the community... we are entirely committed to increasing the pace of delivery... geared towards both addressing legacy issues and overcoming contemporary challenges," he said.
Ignoring the MIC and appealing directly to the hearts of the Indian community, Najib has been calling the Indians to place their nambikei (trust, confidence and hope) in him.
This year's Deepavali celebrations saw the Prime Minister linking the significance of the festival to his transformation programme.
"Deepavali symbolises light and good triumphing over evil. So, if we support the country's transformation programme, it will also mean that darkness will be replaced by light," he said before adding that he hoped that "they (the Indian community) will continue to give their nambikei to the Government."
When asked what his favourite Indian food was, Najib said he liked almost everything but gave the thosai, capati and putumayam a special mention.
The 2012 budget also saw RM100 million being allocated to Tamil schools for maintenance and another RM100 million given to small Indian entrepreneurs through a micro-credit scheme.
One would struggle to remember when was the last time the Indian community received this much attention from the government. There is no doubt that in his attempts to continue to woo the community, more goodies will be given out by Najib to the Indians in the run-up to the next elections.
As a community therefore, the Indians have well and truly risen and the government can no longer ignore them.
What remains to be seen is whether this special attention will result in a big victory for Najib at the next general elections aided by the Indian community--seen to be the kingmakers in at least 50 seats.
If it does, then the question will be whether the special attention will continue or whether the Indian community will be ignored again. Only time will tell.
Until then, the Indian community should ask for the moon.

-mysinchew.com