This topic is what that has made BN and MIC so glad that they are back from being at the brink after the unexpected turn of events in 2008. The Indians were never the kind of community in Malaysia that would go against their political masters ever since they had decided to make Malaysia their home and stayed back from returning to India.
They were here just to make a living and sad to say that is still very much the mindset till today, thanks to the stereotyping and indoctrination by Umno-BN through the education system. What we have today is an Indian society that was simply trying its luck the last time around just to see what would happen if they protested.
Now after seeing that all their wishes have been slow in seeing its realisation, the Indians long for going back to the same old barn (the BN-barn) where they have been the most comfortable no matter what kind of treatment they would get.
The real happennings behind the scenes, the understanding of the division of power between the federal and state governments, these seem to be issues which the Malays and Chinese population understand better than the Indians.
If not for the incarceration of the Hindraf 5, the Malaysian Indians would have never woken up from their long slumber and the MIC will be the proudest party in the BN stable for providing a 100 percent winning ability in delivering nine parliamentary and 19 state legislative seats.
How the federal government manipulates the federal finances and continues to undermine and disrespect the choice of the people in Kedah, Penang, Perak and Selangor is of no concern to the normal Indian on the street.
They don't understand this and neither do they want to understand it, even though some of them may be graduates from local universities. It is never suprising to note that many amongst them are not even bothered to know their constitutional right to vote and their obligation to exercise that right in a democracy.
But the situation is just the opposite amongst the Chinese undergraduates, they are very knowledgable with regard to their right to vote and a vast majority of them are registered voters. Many wait for the opportunity to register themselves as voters and will not sulk if they are asked to go to a shopping mall to get themselves registered as voters.
The Indian undergraduates will find it difficult to even take the effort to learn about voter registration programmes and many have the view that their vote even if registered is not necessary.
Some even have the view that something bad and drastic will happen to them if they vote for any other party except Umno, MIC, MCA, Gerakan and PPP. Therefore with this mindset amongst the young the BN has been a proven winning formula.
Keeping the young Indians misled and misinformed and relying on the old indoctrinated Indians who will vote for a BN candidates - even if he does not even show up in their constituency and speak about national policies and his vision for a brighter and equal standing of the Indians with other races - is the best known way the BN keeps the lid on the Indians.
Indians have made a mistake and Pakatan should not loose much sleep over it, in the wake of the 2008 upheavel a vast group of the highly educated lot amongst them and generally amongst the other races as well have taken it upon themselves to vote for change.
These people understand the shortcomings and are able to see the bigger picture and see that only a two party system can see a proper practice of parliamentary democracy and a system of checks and balances in a country that believes in racial supremacy.
Though this group may be small but the fact is it will have the last laugh at the end of the day. After the 2008 upheaval and a mini revolution, the Indians saw their young graduates being appointed as magistrates, senior assistant registrars, police personnel and customs personnel, a practice which was slowly and surely being eradicated as there was no strong opposition from the Indians.
Besides Lim Kit Siang, Karpal Singh, M Kulasegaran and a few MIC individuals voicing their opposition to the low number of recruits for the professional categories to the civil service, the vast majority of the MIC warriors were not too interested or bothered as they had their eyes on lucrative Ali-Baba contracts which they could make some loads of money from.
The new class of Indian professional category civil servants will now make the new group of voters for the BN and they like their forefathers before them will not vote for any other party besides the BN.
The indoctrination and the divide and rule system has seeped into the Indian mentality with lasting effects. A classic example would be the sudden about turn of a group that was in the forefront with the Hindraf movement but now is a registered political party calling itself the Malaysian Makkal Sakti party.
The overnight U-turn shows how well the indoctrination works and this is very evident in the mindset of the Indian police officers; many of whom are tasked by the police force to infiltrate Indian organisations and NGOs and any sort of movement or grouping that goes against the word of the indoctrinators.
For the Malaysian Indian, their mindset has been tuned to a point that it is difficult for them to see beyond the racial lens which they have been accustomed to all this while. They see it as being acceptable to live out of the handouts and crumbs thrown out by the masters and the indoctrinators
Anything that goes against what the masters and the indoctrinators have spelt out for them will only invite trouble and this will continuously be the mindset, and they continue to live for the day and will not know when the local council will come knocking on their doors to serve them an eviction notice.
For the moment, the Indian Malaysians seems to want to return to the BN but in doing so, they are bound to lose out on the bigger picture eventually. This will happen when the Indian vote becomes insignificant when the newly legalised Malaysians of Indonesian, Filipino, Bangladeshi, Nepali and Middle Eastern dissent become synchronise with the Malaysian population.
They stand a better chance because the majority will be Muslim with many having children here with bin or binti in their names and will be eventually able to find a place for themselves in the definition of bumiputera, while the Indians will eventually lose out in terms of numbers which will then transcend to political power and representation.
The Indian's belief in the mindset that an Indian political party is for Indian voters will be a thing of the past as they will never be able to see themselves on par with their counterparts in Singapore who are not governed by racial and religious politics.
Indians there gain by merit and the best are sought by the government to be included in the national agenda to lead the nation in various fields, looking only at their ability and not the colour of their skin, the race they belong to or the religion they profess.
The programming of the Indian mindset by the indoctrinators is the best way the ruling elite in the BN and Umno can ensure that they stay within the confines of the BN barn. Making them beg for participation has created a community that sees the ruling Malay class as the masters and themselves as the faithful servants.
The masters, seeing that the Indians are faithful servants but lack in the unity department amongst themselves, make full use of this weakness to further exert control on their already stereotyped mindset.
The Tamil Hindu will despise the Tamil Christian, Tamil Muslim, the Malayalee Hindu, Malayalee Christian or the Telugus. In the Tamil Hindu majority, the caste that they belong to though not very significant today but still reminded upon by the elders will further divide them.
This has been well studied by the Umno masters and they exploit them to the hilt. For the Umno masters, all they care about is the vote and the continous if not perpetual right that they think they have to rule this country without question.
The Indians fail to realise that their best bet for the future is through multi-racial parties and politics. A good example will be the leadership of Ambiga Sreenevasan of the recent Bersih 2.0 rally.
Though the Umno-Perkasa-BN hegemonist described and called her the "Hindu Woman who is anti-Islam" because of her participation in Lina Joy's apostasy case, the Malays and Chinese from the opposition, NGO movement, 'thinking' civil society and Malaysians abroad accepted her leadership and looked forward to her brave stewardship of the entire civil task of registering a point with a very stubborn and recalcitrant Umno-BN government.
The Indians in MIC though, while silently proud of her leadership as one of their own ethnicity, never said a word about her bravery and courage in leading the charge to show the Umno-BN government that the people are fed up.
On the other side, the opposition is slowly but surely going on the right track by putting aside the racial mindset that we have all been stereotyped with, and coming out with a more Malaysian approach of looking at the bigger picture to see how we can progress as Malaysians instead of having only ethnicity in our minds.
Therefore looking at most current political reports and opinions that the Indian vote is heading back to the BN barn, one would say, let it be for they will be the eventual losers. Already being seen as the new urban underclass, the common jobs which the Indians will usually be hired for without question is now being taken over by Indonesian, Bangladeshi and Nepali migrants who have now become overnight legalised new-Malaysians.
This phenomena can't be stopped even if Indians in Malaysia were to give MIC nine parliamentary and 19 state legislative seats because the MIC's voice in the cabinet is always heard in low decibels or never heard at all.
Can we blame them? We can't, as they may then loose what little they and their kin are getting as a result kow-towing to their Umno masters. So whether Pakatan gets the Indian votes or not, is an issue which Pakatan shouldn't loose much sleep over; they have set the agenda, the thinking Malays, Chinese and Indians are ready to accept the fact that the only way forward is to be Malaysian first and racial denomination or ethnicity second.
If the Indians want to go back to the BN barn, let them do so.
Malaysiakini :: Berita
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