The Home Ministry has warned it will revoke Tamil Nesan’s annual licence if it continues provocative coverage of last Sunday’s police shootout where five Indians were killed.
Tamil Nesan managing director S Vell Paari has today defended the paper’s coverage, pointing out the shootout has been well covered by other newspapers and the online media.
In a press statement, he confirmed that the country’s oldest Tamil newspaper had received the letter which stated their license would be revoked without further notice if the paper carried on with such news.
The latest development comes in the wake of a decision by Government to backtrack on an earlier decision not to approve next year’s publishing permit for Catholic Newspaper Herald, which is locked in a lawsuit against the ministry over the right to publish the word “Allah” to mean “God” for Christians.
According Vell Paari, who is the son of MIC president Datuk Seri S Samy Vellu, the ministry was concerned their report which included a press statement issued by MIC Youth Information Chief S Subramaniam would provoke Indians and affect the country’s harmony.
But he said the Tamil daily, which was established in 1924, was only reporting what had transpired.
“I’m baffled on how news published by us is going to provoke Indians, when almost all other mainstream media, both print and online, carried the same facts, gave the same prominence and used the same vocabulary for the story,” Vell Paari said in the statement.
“The issue is also being hotly debated in various Blogs and online networking sites like Facebook” he added.
Vell Paari noted the article also related to issue that affects his community and Tamil Nesan had the right publish it, just like other dailies.
“As far as Tamil Nesan is concerned we have maintained a status of fair comment and had only published what happened that day. Nothing more and nothing less,” he said.
By Naragan
Seetha could not take the grief of her little brother Surendran’s death. Surendran was shot dead by the police on the 8th of November. In her grief, she decided to take her life and those of her 4 children yesterday morning.
At about 8.30am she gave everyone Paraquat to drink, telling her children that they will be able to meet their Uncle if they all drank the medicine. All of them drank it. Their lives are now in limbo as I write this article. They are all in the ICU.
Can you imagine Seetha’s state of mind that she should make such a decision. Not only her life but all her little ones as well. Can you imagine?
It pains me to even think about the state of her mind as she was giving them all the poison. Can I ever imagine doing this myself – what would ever make me do such a thing. You kill the people you love and take your own life when you feel it is totally the end of the road, that there is no more hope or purpose to living. Is this what Seetha had in her mind at that fateful moment?
I do not know enough to write about the exact circumstances. But some facts are undeniable. The attempted suicide here happened due to circumstances of poverty. Seetha’s husband is a lorry driver. Her father is a Security Guard. She was a housewife. This is so typical of the Indian poor. Security Guards and Lorry Drivers are all they can aspire to. Surendran was 24 years old like so many others of his age group who fall victim to crime.
How did Surendran get involved in crime – what took him there. For young Indian men who do not see much upward mobility in a life as a lorry driver or as a security guard (that is all that is available to them for their academic accomplishments in the Apartheid Malaysian system), crime seems to be an answer. Young as they are, they are oblivious or just plain unthinking about the incumbent risks and this is where they end up.
I cannot but conclude that this is really a crime committed against this family and against so many others like them. This story is not about Surendran’s crime or about Seetha’s attempted suicide but about the racist UMNO regime’s crime of causing the literal obliteration of Seetha’s family. You may accuse me of being mad, of being totally foolish to say this, to assign blame willy nilly. Audacious as my blaming may be, give me an alternative explanation for this repeating pattern in these problems.
It is so blatantly clear to me that it is UMNO’s policy of continuing the total neglect of the Indian poor that leads the Indian poor to this end. They pay no attention to this problem. They are in total denial. They just do not care. They sentence these Indians to a life of deprivation and abandonment.
Why does the UMNO regime not acknowledge this line of reasoning and open up opportunities for young Indians in this high risk group? There are thousands of development programs that the UMNO regime administers in the country – why do they not open them up and allow these young men into that
mainstream?
My answer is plain and simple. It serves UMNO no purpose to do that. In fact, the opposite effect serves them a better purpose. As more Indian young men go crime’s way, they are all condemned one way or another to the dregs of Malaysian society to be finally disposed off like this. End of story for UMNO, no more problem. UMNO has divided up this country for that; the result being such tragedies.
Why does Seetha for her part see this as the end of the road? What is her background? How does she see this world? What is her state of knowledge? What is she looking at being a mother of 4 at the age of 31 and a wife to a lorry driver? Lorry driving is back breaking - long hours, away from home for long stretches, a low social status. What is the implication of all this to her? What does her brother mean to her? Is she not entitled to a luxury of some love for a little brother, no matter that he may be all wrapped up in crime now? I do not have answers to all these questions but having been through life myself I can venture some guesses. It comes back to the same answer. Seetha has been denied an even shot at life.
I hope Seetha and her little ones come through over the next few days. What this means to the rest of us is that we have to wake up from our slumber and start asking some real hard questions. It is time that the likes of Seetha get what is their due.
Why do our politicians say the darnedest things? For instance, Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein was reported to have said that public vilification of government institutions is a factor contributing to the country’s rampant crime.
That’s Terminator-esque logic, that one; I’ll see if I can spell it out. Is Hishammuddin saying that our experience of being robbed, and the subsequent inability of the police to apprehend the bastards who robbed us, thereby leading us to think them (the police, not the thieving bastards) an irritatingly unhelpful bunch of twats, is the reason why we were robbed again? If that is so: James Cameron, eat your heart out.
I’m a simple person. I like to see the reason why we have more crime as being down to the simple fact that we have more criminals. And the reason why we have more criminals is that the people responsible for catching these thieving bastards and locking them away aren’t doing so.
I can hardly see why my calling them all manner of names for not having done so contributes to their ability, or inability, to do so in the first place.
Or, perhaps, Hishammuddin means the way our police force has gained Gestapo-like imagery, replete with “mysterious” deaths in custody. Again, I’m a simple man. I cannot see how having such a frighteningly ferocious image can in any way contribute to an increase in crime rates.
I would have thought knowing that in the event you’re nicked for, let’s say stealing a car, that you’ll inexplicably drown in a glass of water while being held in police custody, would prove a sufficiently strong deterrent towards crime rather than providing further encouragement. But that’s just me. Who can fathom how the devious minds of criminals actually work?
Criminals of a more violent disposition (those naughty, naughty boys who like to play with knives and guns) would also no doubt tremble at the risk of engaging in “police shootouts” with the crack shots that populate our police force. Those who run afoul of this lot often tell no tales in the aftermath. Makes you think twice about leading a life of crime, doesn’t it?
As for white-collared criminals, the motivation to dip your hand into the cookie jar must be enough to make the earth move. Because the very real and present danger of having to negotiate the treacherously slippery window sills of Plaza Masalam for a breather during marathon questioning, should you be nicked with chocolate stains on your lips, bears serious contemplation.
Of course, all of the above are just some of the “perceptions” that the public may have of the various institutions.
But again, I put it to Hishammuddin: Do any of these actually create more crime? If anything, these make it obvious that the “perceived” stakes for criminals have gone up, not down. Why are people still breaking laws?
In any case, I’d like to offer some suggestions to Hishammuddin, on the premise that his assumption that it’s our lowly views of the government institutions that makes them ineffectual at their duties. At any rate, what’s there to lose?
Maybe you shouldn’t be sending 60 people to go arrest an unlicensed preacher. His name isn’t David Koresh, there is no Mount Carmel, and most certainly no automatic weapons are present. The same goes for opposition politicians, sending in siege teams is overkill.
Maybe you shouldn’t send an army of coppers to turn Ipoh into a warzone every time the bloody state assembly convenes. It’s a bunch of state assemblymen shouting at each other. What are you afraid of, that they’ll cuss each other to death?
Maybe you shouldn’t bother hauling up nutters cycling around the country to highlight social iniquities. While it’s alright to hate cyclists in general, even this was too much. Besides, they’re cycling in our weather; that’s already punishment enough.
Maybe you shouldn’t turn parks into battlefields every time a bunch of people want to get together and light a few candles, and maybe sing the national anthem. If they’re not crazy arsonists, your cops could be doing more useful things elsewhere. Plus, it’s good that people sing Negaraku, isn’t it?
Maybe you should have the MACC get its priorities right. Nobody is saying small graft is not graft. But between investigating the misuse of a couple of thousand ringgit in state funds and an unemployed dentist with a multi-million mansion, I think even you know which matter is the more pressing.
Maybe, just maybe, if all of these were so, you might be standing in Parliament and telling Malaysia how something is being done to make the country safe for one and all.
Because the alternative of going there and saying crime is high because we don’t think the world of government institutions, should be a crime in itself.
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