Modi woos Malaysia but here's a reality check
Prime Minister Narendra Modi wooed Malaysia no end during his just-concluded three-day trip to the Southeast Asian country, but a crucial question is whether he was briefed properly about the difficulties faced by the Malaysians of Indian origin.
Modi's intentions for upgrading the five-year-old strategic partnership between India and Malaysia are noble, and India needs to emulate Malaysia on at least two counts - Malaysia has almost eradicated poverty and achieved almost 100 per cent literacy. However, it is a pity that during the prime minister's various public engagements and interactions with the Malaysian leadership, he did not address issues raised in the Malaysian Indian Minority and Human Rights Violations annual report, 2010.
The explosive report was compiled by the Hindu Rights Action Force (HINDRAF) and distributed by its activists at the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas in New Delhi in January 2011. It asked the Indian government to terminate all present and future business projects with Malaysia in view of “grave human rights violations” by the Malaysian government against the Indian community in the country.
There are about two million people of Indian origin in Malaysia who constitute eight per cent of the total population of the country.
The HINDRAF report, prepared on the basis of news reports published in major Malaysian dailies like The Star, Straits Times and The Utusan Malaysia, said that 95 per cent of the people killed by the Malaysian police were ethnic Indians.
It also said that 90 per cent of the custodial deaths and 80 per cent of the people who experienced "police harassment, unlawful arrests, frivolous and malicious prosecutions" were Malaysian Indians; at least 48 per cent of the prisoners in 28 prisons of Malaysia were ethnic Indians; and in 2010 alone, 5,000 Indians were arrested and detained under the Emergency Ordinance.
And yet, in his speech at the Indian community event in Malaysia on November 22, Modi did not make a single reference to the HINDRAF report. In the entire 3,603-word speech, he had only the following 136 words to say about the welfare of Indian community in Malaysia:
"We have an Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) and a fund to help distressed Indian women abroad. There are times when workers from India get into difficulties here. Their welfare and security are at the top of our concerns. Last year, we assisted more than 8,000 Indian workers to return home safely. In Malaysia an India-Students Trust Fund was set up in 1954 to give financial assistance to Malaysian-Indian children who lacked the means for education. This fund is still needed by a section of the Indian community in Malaysia. We are happy to announce a grant of about 1 million US dollars in additional funds to the corpus of the trust fund... Malaysia and India should immediately recognise the degrees conferred by both our countries. This is something I intend to take up with prime minister Najib.”
One doesn’t know as of now whether Modi was not briefed at all about the HINDRAF report, or whether he was briefed but chose to ignore it.
However, the Joint Statement on enhanced Malaysia-India Strategic Partnership released on November 23 talks of many specific measures to further strengthen this relationship. Here is a list of decisions taken by the two governments:
1. To hold regular summits, including on the margins of multilateral events.
2. To arrange regular exchanges at the Cabinet level between the ministers in charge of trade and industry, transport, public works and infrastructure, in line with the new development initiatives introduced by India, and the investment and trade opportunities opening up in each other’s country.
3. To promote joint collaboration, especially in infrastructure and construction sectors, and to facilitate joint projects and collaboration between the private sectors of the two countries, in line with the new development and business initiatives undertaken by India, such as Make in India, Digital India, and smart cities and skill development projects that offered significant investment opportunities for Malaysian businesses.
4. To enhance defence exchanges through regular dialogue at various levels, including between defence ministers, senior defence officials, chiefs of the armed services and through service-to-service staff talks.
5. To institute annual talks between the heads of the Indian Coast Guard and the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, including during the Head of Asian Coast Guard Agencies Meeting (HACGAM).