ABSTRACT
Malaysia is a veritable template of a pluralistic, multi-ethnic and multi-religious society in Southeast Asia, with a demographic distribution of Malays/Bumiputeras, Chinese and Indians to the tune of 60.3%, 22.9% and 7.1% respectively of the total population of 28.34 million (2010 Census). Following independence in 1957, racial riots became a regular feature of its post-colonial social fabric. Before the introduction of the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1970, the Indians preceded the Malays in their economic status. However, with the adoption of Article 153 of the Constitution, granting special privileges to the Malays, followed by NEP (1970–1990) and the National Development Policy (NDP, 1990–2000), the Indians were economically marginalized, as evaluated at the end of these two programmes’ tenure. This economic degradation made the Indian community quite vulnerable and its fallout was the racial riots of 2001. Moreover, the birth of the Hindu Rights Action Front (HINDRAF) and suppression of their movement in 2007 by the government through the implementation of the draconian Internal Security Act led to severe political unrest. The maltreatment of overseas Indians, mainly the Tamil community, caused severe repercussions among the Tamil people settled in India, who requested the then Government of India to interfere in the internal affairs of Malaysia. This request created a dilemma for the Indian Government: how to meet the demands of one of its coalition partners without jeopardizing its bilateral relations with Malaysia? India was also faced with the daunting questions of whether it could shirk away from its responsibilities towards people of Indian origin and what long-term policy ought to be followed by the Indian Government to ameliorate the conditions of ethnic Indians without being misunderstood as interfering in the domestic affairs of the host country. Given this backdrop, the paper examines the status and economic position of the Malaysian Indians as an ethnic group in the multi-racial plural society of Malaysia in the context of the NEP and NDP since 1970. It also scrutinizes at a micro level how the emerging coalition-cum-provincial politics in India creates occasional repercussions on the formulation of its foreign policy, with a bearing on bilateral ties.
