There has not been a single attempt by Pakatan to engage Hindraf into drawing up plans for the grouses they represent.

By N Ganesan, FMT

Is there a surprise in the fact that after Hindraf has tried very actively since August 2012 to work with Pakatan Rakyat to develop a win-win formula for Pakatan and for the Indian poor in the forthcoming elections, that Pakatan will turn around and give the Indian poor the shaft as they have done with their general election manifesto pledges?

In my mind there is some surprise. I expected that the political and electoral alignments may not work out.

But I did not imagine that Pakatan would do it with such callousness and then defend their actions unapologetically and with impunity that they did alright in their GE2013 electoral manifesto.

PKR strategy director Rafizi Ramli’s statement in his debate with MCA vice president Gan Ping Siew yesterday is most telling.

Let me quote him from media reports here. He is supposed to have uttered the following words “Pakatan manifesto is for all, not just Indians”.

What rubbish is this? Completely wild and in my opinion simply tells of Pakatan impunity.

In retrospect, this tendency to deceive the Indians in general and the Indian poor in specific have been clear from 2008 after the 12th GE.

For the tsunami that Hindraf created for Pakatan, there has not been one attempt, not one single attempt to engage Hindraf, the prime mover during that heyday into drawing up plans for the grouses they represented.

That was clearly a predictor for larger things to come. And we have just seen that.

I can understand their logic, said and repeated in so many ways. They only want the votes from the Indians but not their representation in the August houses of parliament and state assemblies.

The working class has no business there.

Their refrain is – just remain a pressure group, do not ask for seats, do not ask for leadership of ministries, just stay out there, get us the votes and then maybe we will give your Mandores some crumbs.

But you stay out there.

You see that re-enactment clearly in their latest stances.

The writer is Hindraf’s national advisor