HINDRAF - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

HINDRAF or Hindu Rights Action Force ' onMouseout='HidePop("77136")' href="/topics/Tamil_language">Tamil

Tamil language

Tamil is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of the Indian subcontinent. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and in the Indian union territory of Pondicherry. Tamil is also an official language of Sri Lanka and Singapore...

: (இந்து உரிமைகள் போராட்டக் குழு (Hindu Urimaigal Poratta Kulu); Chinese

Chinese language

The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...

:兴权 with its slogan of People's Power மக்கள் சக்தி (Makkal Sakthi)) began as a coalition of 30 Hindu

Hindu

Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...

non-governmental organizations committed to the preservation of Hindu community

Hinduism in Malaysia

Hinduism is a minority religion in Malaysia. An estimated 7.1% of the total population of Malaysia are ethnic Indians, of whom 76% are practicing Hinduism. Most of the ethnic Indians are Tamils from the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu...

rights and heritage in a multiracial Malaysia. .
HINDRAF has made a major impact to the political landscape of Malaysia in staging the 2007 HINDRAF rally

2007 HINDRAF rally

The 2007 HINDRAF rally was a rally held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on November 25, 2007. The rally organizer, the Hindu Rights Action Force, had called the protest over alleged discriminatory policies which favour ethnic Malays...

. In late 2007, several prominent members of the HINDRAF were arrested, some on charges of sedition

Sedition

In law, sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that is deemed by the legal authority to tend toward insurrection against the established order. Sedition often includes subversion of a constitution and incitement of discontent to lawful authority. Sedition may include any...

; following an enormous rally organised by HINDRAF in November. The charges were dismissed by the courts. Five people have since been detained without trial under the Internal Security Act

Internal Security Act (Malaysia)

The Internal Security Act 1960 is a preventive detention law in force in Malaysia. The legislation was enacted after Malaysia gained independence from Britain in 1957. The ISA allows for detention without trial or criminal charges under limited, legally defined circumstances...

.The group has over the last two years developed a broader political program to preserve and to push for equal rights and opportunities for the minority Indians. It has been successful in continuing to focus attention on the racist aspects of the Malaysian Government policies.

Background

Between April to May 2006, several Hindu temples were demolished by city hall authorities in the country, accompanied by violence against Hindus. On April 21, 2006, the Malaimel Sri Selva Kaliamman Temple in Kuala Lumpur was reduced to rubble after the city hall sent in bulldozers.

The president of the Consumers Association of Subang and Shah Alam in Selangor State has been helping to organise efforts to stop the local authorities in the Muslim dominated city of Shah Alam from demolishing a 107-year-old Hindu temple. The growing Islamization in Malaysia is a cause for concern to many Malaysians who follow minority religions such as Hinduism. On May 11, 2006, armed city hall officers from Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur is the capital and the second largest city in Malaysia by population. The city proper, making up an area of , has a population of 1.4 million as of 2010. Greater Kuala Lumpur, also known as the Klang Valley, is an urban agglomeration of 7.2 million...

forcefully demolished part of a 60-year-old suburban temple that serves more than 1,000 Hindus.

The Hindu Rights Action Force or HINDRAF, a coalition of several NGO's, have protested these demolitions by lodging complaints with the Prime Minister of Malaysia

Prime Minister of Malaysia

The Prime Minister of Malaysia is the indirectly elected head of government of Malaysia. He is officially appointed by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, the head of state, who in HM's judgment is likely to command the confidence of the majority of the members of that House of Representatives , the...

but with no response. Many Hindu advocacy groups have protested what they allege is a systematic plan of temple cleansing in Malaysia. The official reason given by the Malaysian government has been that the temples were built "illegally". However, several of the temples are centuries old.
According to a lawyer for HINDRAF, a Hindu temple

Hindu temple

A Mandir, Devalayam, Devasthanam, or a Hindu temple is a place of worship for followers of Hinduism...

is demolished in Malaysia once every three weeks.

Laws in the country, especially those concerning religious identity, are generally slanted towards compulsion into converting to Islam

Arrests in October 2007

On 30 October, four HINDRAF Group fellows and human rights, namely M. Manoharan

M. Manoharan

Manoharan s/o Malayalam more commonly known as M. Manoharan is a prominent Malaysian lawyer and currently the State Assemblyman for Kota Alam Shah in the Selangor State Assembly. He is a member of the Democratic Action Party....

, P. Uthayakumar

P. Uthayakumar

Uthayakumar s/o Ponnusamy is a Malaysian lawyer of Tamil origin. He is the older brother of P. Waytha Moorthy, the Hindu Rights Action Force lawyer who headed a team of lawyers to file a class action suit against the United Kingdom for "abandoning minority Indians to the mercy of majoritarian...

, P. Waytha Moorthy

Waytha Moorthy Ponnusamy

Waytha Moorthy Ponnusamy sometimes spelt Waythamoorthy is a Malaysian lawyer of Tamil origin who is currently a member of the HINDRAF campaign to fight discrimination against Malaysian Hindus.-Early life:...

and S. Ganapathi Rao, were arrested and detained for taking part in the 2007 HINDRAF demonstration against the demolishing of a Hindu

Hindu

shrine in Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

. However, they were acquitted due to a lack of evidence of incitement and sedition.

Human Rights Forum

A series of peaceful weekend forums were organized throughout Malaysia to increase the awareness of Hindu human rights

Persecution of Hindus

Persecution of Hindus refers to the religious persecution inflicted upon Hindus. Hindus have been historically persecuted during Islamic rule of the Indian subcontinent and during the Goa Inquisition...

by HINDRAF. A previous forum held near central Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

had been disrupted by the Royal Malaysian Police

Royal Malaysian Police

The Royal Malaysia Police is a part of the security forces structure in Malaysia. The force is a centralised organization with responsibilities ranging from traffic control to intelligence gathering. Its headquarters is located at Bukit Aman, Kuala Lumpur. The police force is led by an...

, according to HINDRAF .
Subsequently, HINDRAF appealed directly to the Inspector General of the Malaysian Police in an attempt to ensure future forums went on peacefully.

Arrests in November

On 23 November 2007, three HINDRAF, P. Uthayakumar, Waytha Moorthy, and V.S. Ganapathi Rao, were arrested and charged under the Sedition Act

Sedition Act

Sedition Act may refer to:*Alien and Sedition Acts, including the Sedition Act of 1798, laws passed by the United States Congress*Sedition Act 1661, an English statute that largely relates to treason...

. However, in a series of repeated arrests and releases, the courts could not prove that they had incited racial hatred. The only evidence against them were unreliable translations of their Tamil speeches into Bahasa Malaysia presented by the Attorney-General's Chambers, which the courts deemed as unverifiable. Eventually, they were all acquitted due to a shaky prosecution and the lack of evidence of any wrongdoing or crime.

Petition and rally

On August 31, 2007, the 50th anniversary of Malaysia's independence, P. Waytha Moorthy

Waytha Moorthy Ponnusamy

, a HINDRAF lawyer filed a class action

Class action

In law, a class action, a class suit, or a representative action is a form of lawsuit in which a large group of people collectively bring a claim to court and/or in which a class of defendants is being sued...

suit against the Government of the United Kingdom

Government of the United Kingdom

Her Majesty's Government is the central government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Government is led by the Prime Minister, who selects all the remaining Ministers...

at The Royal Courts of Justice

Royal Courts of Justice

The Royal Courts of Justice, commonly called the Law Courts, is the building in London which houses the Court of Appeal of England and Wales and the High Court of Justice of England and Wales...

in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

for US$4 trillion (US$1 million for every Malaysian Indian) for "withdrawing after granting independence and leaving us (Indians) unprotected and at the mercy of a majority Malay-Muslim government that has violated our rights as minority Indians" as guaranteed in the Federal Constitution

Constitution of Malaysia

The Federal Constitution of Malaysia, which came into force in 1957, is the supreme law of Malaysia. The Federation was initially called the Federation of Malaya and it adopted its present name, Malaysia, when the States of Sabah, Sarawak and Singapore joined the Federation...

when independence was granted.

The lawsuit is not only claiming 4 trillion British Pounds

Pound sterling

The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...

as compensation, it is also seeking to strike out Article 153 of the Malaysian Constitution which acknowledges Malay Supremacy

Ketuanan Melayu

Ketuanan Melayu is a political concept emphasizing Malay preeminence in present day Malaysia. The Malays of peninsular Malaysia claimed a special position and special rights owing to their long domicile and the role of the Malay rulers of the nine Malay states...

and for the court to declare that Malaysia is a secular state

Secular state

A secular state is a concept of secularism, whereby a state or country purports to be officially neutral in matters of religion, supporting neither religion nor irreligion. A secular state also claims to treat all its citizens equally regardless of religion, and claims to avoid preferential...

and not an Islamic state

Islamic State

An Islamic state is a type of government, in which the primary basis for government is Islamic religious law...

as declared by former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad who is partly Indian himself.

As the group, which represents mainly working class Indian Malaysians, could not afford the legal fees required, a petition was circulated with 100,000 signatures to be presented to Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom to appoint a Queen's counsel

Queen's Counsel

Queen's Counsel , known as King's Counsel during the reign of a male sovereign, are lawyers appointed by letters patent to be one of Her [or His] Majesty's Counsel learned in the law...

to argue the case. The purpose of the rally was to hand over a 100,000 signature memorandum to the British Embassy in Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

.

HINDRAF organized the rally on Sunday, November 25, 2007 to submit the petition at the British High Commission. Malaysian police refused to grant a permit for the rally, and set up roadblocks in Klang Valley

Klang Valley

Klang Valley is an area in Malaysia comprising Kuala Lumpur and its suburbs, and adjoining cities and towns in the state of Selangor. An alternative reference to this would be Kuala Lumpur Metropolitan Area or Greater Kuala Lumpur. It is geographically delineated by Titiwangsa Mountains to the...

along roads leading up to the rally to screen motorists entering the city center and identify "troublemakers". They also advised the public not to participate in the rally, and arrested three leaders of HINDRAF. Many shops around Kuala Lumpur including Suria KLCC

Suria KLCC

Suria KLCC is Malaysia's premier shopping centre located at the base of the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur City Centre based in Kuala Lumpur. It is located on 6 floors, with anchor tenants Isetan, Parkson Grand, Cold Storage Supermarket, Tanjong Golden Village, Signature's Level 2 Food Court...

were closed on that day in fear of trouble from the rally.

One day before the rally, police arrested three HINDRAF lawyers, P. Uthayakumar

P. Uthayakumar

, P. Waytha Moorthy and V. Ganabatirau for sedition charges. Uthayakumar and Ganabatirau posted bail of 800 Malaysian ringgit

Malaysian ringgit

The Malaysian ringgit is the currency of Malaysia. It is divided into 100 sen...

s each, but Waytha Moorthy refused bail as a sign of protest.

The police roadblocks started the week before the rally to create massive traffic jams across the city and the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

. The Malaysian Opposition leader Lim Kit Siang of the DAP pointed out that this high-handed act by the police was unnecessary as it caused major inconvenience to everyone.

On the morning of the rally, an estimated twenty thousand people gathered near the Petronas Twin Towers

Petronas Twin Towers

The Petronas Towers are skyscrapers and twin towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia...

in Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

, carrying life-size portraits of Queen Elizabeth and Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi , pronounced . 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement...

, to indicate the nonviolent nature of their protest. Five thousand members riot police dispatched to the scene used tear gas and water cannon to disperse the crowds. 136 people were arrested.

Al-Jazeera's coverage of the event showed police officers using tear gas to disperse the protesters. A few hundred protesters and three police officers were injured.

The protest at the Batu Caves

Batu Caves

Batu Caves , is a limestone hill, which has a series of caves and cave temples, located in Gombak district, north of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It takes its name from the Sungai Batu or Batu River, which flows past the hill. Batu Caves is also the name of the nearby village.The cave is one of the...

resulted in minor property damages, although the Hindu temple itself was not damaged.

HINDRAF later claimed to have faxed the petition to the British High Commission staff. However, as of 28 November, the British Envoy had not yet received any petition from the HINDRAF, though they did say they had received some unspecified information by fax.

Response from the Government

Malaysian prime minister, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi

Abdullah Ahmad Badawi

Tun Abdullah bin Haji Ahmad Badawi is a Malaysian politician who served as Prime Minister from 2003 to 2009. He was also the President of the United Malays National Organisation , the largest political party in Malaysia, and led the governing Barisan Nasional parliamentary coalition...

warned that the government will invoke the Internal Security Act

Internal Security Act

The term Internal Security Act is often given to a piece of legislation laying down regulations that enable the executive government of a jurisdiction to preserve the internal security of the nation...

against the demonstrators if they needed. The prime minister further criticised the demonstrators, after he made a promise that he will listen to everyone even if they have unpleasant words to say, the government of Abdullah also attempted to link terrorism with the Hindraf rally via the media.

As of 11 December 2007, the HINDRAF leaders were all acquitted by the judicial courts due to lack of evidence and a flimsy prosecution case against their allegations. In order to contain the movement while not being able to charge them according to valid evidence-based legal processes, on 12 December 2007 Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi personally signed the detention letters to imprison the HINDRAF leaders under the ISA

Internal Security Act (Malaysia)

for two years, in which their detention terms are subject to infinite renewal. The reason given for this arrest was that the HINDRAF leadership has had links with international terrorist organizations such as LTTE and also supposedly militant organizations in the mould of RSS in India. The invocation of the ISA to capture the HINDRAF leaders was seen as a strategic move by the UMNO government to arrest the momentum generated by HINDRAF.

The UMNO lead Government has threatened the Malaysian Indian community with sweeping arrests under the Emergency Act and ISA (similar to Operasi Lalang of the 1987, which targeted anti-BN elements in Malaysia, mostly of Malaysian Chinese extraction). This hardline approach is also softened by the MIC reconciliatory approach to blunt HINDRAF's thrust as the champion of the Malaysian Indian community.

Response to the Detentions

Even as Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi

Abdullah Ahmad Badawi

started threatening to use the ISA against the HINDRAF leaders for bringing Malaysia's racist policies out into the open for all to see, foreign news outlets criticized Badawi's lack of initiative to tackle the root cause of the problem. The detention without trial of the HINDRAF leaders drew negative comments in the foreign press about Badawi's administration and the poor way that the Government of Malaysia were handling the issue.

The Democratic Action Party

Democratic Action Party

The Democratic Action Party, or DAP is a secular, multi-racial, social democratic Malaysian political party.The DAP is one of the three major opposition parties in Malaysia, along with the PKR and PAS, that are seen as electable alternatives to the Barisan Nasional coalition of parties...

vowed to challenge the detention of the HINDRAF leaders. Despite the arrests, the opposition and most of the NGOs were unfazed and continued to challenge UMNO's deconstruction of democracy in Malaysia. The United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

had also voiced their disapproval of this latest round of ISA arrests.

The official HINDRAF website at http://www.policewatchmalaysia.com has been allowed by Malaysian ISPs again, after a brief ban. However this site is constantly plagued by faults and downtime. In response to the ban, sites such as http://www.hindraf.org, http://www.myhindraf.com were spawned to maintain awareness of this movement, in addition to the many blogs available. The movement started in Malaysia, has grown global and now has following in UK, Australia, Canada and USA.

There has also been candlelight vigils at Hindu

Hindu

temples throughout Malaysia to protest the detention of five leaders of the HINDRAF. This was condemned by Malaysian minister Samy Vellu

Samy Vellu

Dato' Seri Samy Vellu Sangalimuthu is an Indian Malaysian politician. He is the longest serving President of the Malaysian Indian Congress , a component party of the Barisan Nasional coalition, holding the position since 1979, for 11 consecutive terms...

War of the Roses

The Rose to the PM campaign was mooted to present a humanistic element in HINDRAF's campaign. The central focus of this campaign was the delivery of a rose, as a symbol of love and compassion, to the Malaysian Prime Minister at the Malaysian Parliament by Vwaishnavi Wathya Moorthy (aged 5). This symbolic act was to occur on the 16th February 2008, but the Malaysian Lower House was dissolved for the Federal Elections on the 13th February 2008.

In a dramatic show of force, the police fired teargas and targeted water cannon at several hundred ethnic Indians at the centre of Kuala Lumpur. More than 200 people were detained by the authorities after being attacked by the police near the site of an Indian temple.

The Impact of HINDRAF on the 12th Malaysian General Elections

The 12th general Election showed how HINDRAF had become one of the triggers for a major change in the course of the country. The general dissatisfaction with the regime ruled by UMNO which had been brewing for some years was the kerosene and Hindraf Rally of the 25th of November was the tinder that sparked off the kerosene into a major explosion in what has come to be called a Political Tsunami in Malaysian politics.

The ruling UMNO led government lost its two thirds majority in Parliament and came close to getting just over half the seats in Parliament from the Peninsula. HINDRAF which had barely existed for 3 years up to that time, and which was barely known up till August 2007 suddenly had caught the mood of a large proportion of Malaysians, not only Indians and Hindus but the Chinese and a sizeable section of the Malays as well, causing a major upset in the process.

HINDRAF declared illegal

After several warnings by the Malaysian government HINDRAF was officially banned on October 15, 2008, confirmed by Malaysian Home Minister Datuk Seri Syed Hamid Albar.

In a statement issued at the ministry, Syed Hamid said the decision to declare HINDRAF as an illegal organisation was made following the ministry being satisfied with facts and evidence that showed HINDRAF had and was being used for unlawful purposes and posed a threat to public order and morality.

“Based on powers vested under Section 5(1) of the Societies Act, HINDRAF from today is declared an illegal organisation,” he said.

He said the order was being made as a result of monitoring and investigation on the organisation’s activities by the Registrar of Societies (ROs) and Home Ministry, since Hindraf’s inception.

More detentions by the Malaysian government

On October 23, 2008 a group comprising eight men, three women and a child, were arrested by the police after they tried to hand a memorandum to the Prime Minister's office. The memorandum called for the release of the five Hindraf leaders from detention under the Internal Security Act.
It was discovered that Hindraf leader P.Waythamoorthy's six year old daughter was amongst the people arrested.

Interlok

On February 27, 2011, HINDRAF organised a demonstration in Kuala Lumpur

Kuala Lumpur

protesting against the government's decision to include the Malay language novel Interlok
Interlok
Interlok is a 1971 Malay language novel written by Malaysian national laureate Abdullah Hussain. The novel was included in the syllabus for the Malay Literature subject as compulsory reading for students in Form 5 in schools throughout Malaysia...

in the school curriculum as compulsory reading for the Malay literature subject for students in secondary 5. HINDRAF alleges that Interlok contained disparaging remarks against Malaysian Indians and is deemed racist. The police arrested 109 people for allegedly taking part in an illegal demonstration.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Background

Arrests in October 2007

Human Rights Forum

Arrests in November

Petition and rally

Response from the Government

Response to the Detentions

War of the Roses

The Impact of HINDRAF on the 12th Malaysian General Elections

HINDRAF declared illegal

More detentions by the Malaysian government

Interlok

See also

External links