The socioeconomic problems of a large number of Indians are rooted in the plantation economy. For several generations, they have been dependent on the plantation companies for employment and housing. These plantation resident communities earned low wages, lived in poor conditions without adequate facilities, experienced low levels of health care and personal wellbeing while their children were educated in poorly equipped Tamil primary schools. Government rural development programmes in the 70s and 80s never reached them because the plantations, including the workers’ living quarters, were classified as private property. Though the government recognized plantation workers as a poverty group and indicated that specific strategies would be adopted to improve the housing and quality of life of the estate population, little was done to improve their lot.
As the country progressed, recording impressive economic growth rates from the 1980s, the largely Indian plantation resident communities were left behind as well as became victims to the overall national development. Over 300,000 Indian poor have been displaced after the plantations were acquired for property and township development in the last two decades. When evicted from the plantations, these people not only lost their jobs, but, more importantly, housing, crèches, basic amenities, sociocultural facilities and the estate community support structure built up over decades.
They also lost the plots of vegetable farming and cattle grazing land allotted to them by the plantation companies to cultivate and supplement their modest household incomes. It was not unexpected that these people would face difficulties and hardship in negotiating the transition from the plantations to urban living. Despite the very large number of people involved in this involuntary stream of migration and full knowledge of the traumatic impacts of this displacement, little or nothing has been done to provide skills training and resettle these communities in more sustainable and improved livelihoods.
Consequently, the displaced plantation communities, with no skills and little savings, have swelled the ranks of urban squatter settlements and low cost dwellings. Most of these communities have began and ended in the lower rung jobs, competing with foreign migrant workers for meager incomes. The youths especially feel alienated in the new urban environment, and some have turned to antisocial activities due to the lack of opportunities in their lives.
Overall, two main groups of Indians come within the lowest 30 per cent income category
of Malaysians. The first group comprises the Indian poor living and working in the plantations and who are not included in the many rural based poverty eradication programmes.
The second group comprises those uprooted from the rubber plantations in recent decades and presently living in urban centers or the urban periphery. The Indian urban poor, together with urban poor from other ethnic groups, comprises a critical target group that needs urgent attention.
There has been a noticeable absence of programmes and budgetary resources by government provided to assist the community. This needs to be corrected in urban development sector plans and must be put in place to target them.
The development strategies, policies, programmes, and the distribution of benefits have been highly skewed. Sharp contradictions have arisen as the country’s strategies have become focused on creating a Malay commercial and industrial community. The poverty eradication programmes have also assumed a rural Malay bias.
Although the incidence of rural poverty remains relatively high and the Malays form the largest group among the poor, the numerically small and economically weak ethnic minorities are increasingly feeling alienated, neglected and marginalised. The Orang Asli, the bumiputera minorities in Sabah and Sarawak and the Indian low income groups have long standing complaints that the various development plans have not resolved their socioeconomic problems.
Orang Asli remain the country’s poorest and most marginalised group. Persistent poverty also characterises the lives of bumiputera minorities in Sabah and Sarawak, in part due to neglect and in part because of the inability of conventional approaches to reach these groups due to inaccessibility and other structural constraints. In the case of the Indians, the changes in the plantation sector have rendered very large numbers homeless and forced these unskilled people to eke out a precarious living in the urban areas.
As the country progressed, recording impressive economic growth rates from the 1980s, the largely Indian plantation resident communities were left behind as well as became victims to the overall national development. Over 300,000 Indian poor have been displaced after the plantations were acquired for property and township development in the last two decades. When evicted from the plantations, these people not only lost their jobs, but, more importantly, housing, crèches, basic amenities, sociocultural facilities and the estate community support structure built up over decades.
They also lost the plots of vegetable farming and cattle grazing land allotted to them by the plantation companies to cultivate and supplement their modest household incomes. It was not unexpected that these people would face difficulties and hardship in negotiating the transition from the plantations to urban living. Despite the very large number of people involved in this involuntary stream of migration and full knowledge of the traumatic impacts of this displacement, little or nothing has been done to provide skills training and resettle these communities in more sustainable and improved livelihoods.
Consequently, the displaced plantation communities, with no skills and little savings, have swelled the ranks of urban squatter settlements and low cost dwellings. Most of these communities have began and ended in the lower rung jobs, competing with foreign migrant workers for meager incomes. The youths especially feel alienated in the new urban environment, and some have turned to antisocial activities due to the lack of opportunities in their lives.
Overall, two main groups of Indians come within the lowest 30 per cent income category
of Malaysians. The first group comprises the Indian poor living and working in the plantations and who are not included in the many rural based poverty eradication programmes.
The second group comprises those uprooted from the rubber plantations in recent decades and presently living in urban centers or the urban periphery. The Indian urban poor, together with urban poor from other ethnic groups, comprises a critical target group that needs urgent attention.
There has been a noticeable absence of programmes and budgetary resources by government provided to assist the community. This needs to be corrected in urban development sector plans and must be put in place to target them.
The development strategies, policies, programmes, and the distribution of benefits have been highly skewed. Sharp contradictions have arisen as the country’s strategies have become focused on creating a Malay commercial and industrial community. The poverty eradication programmes have also assumed a rural Malay bias.
Although the incidence of rural poverty remains relatively high and the Malays form the largest group among the poor, the numerically small and economically weak ethnic minorities are increasingly feeling alienated, neglected and marginalised. The Orang Asli, the bumiputera minorities in Sabah and Sarawak and the Indian low income groups have long standing complaints that the various development plans have not resolved their socioeconomic problems.
Orang Asli remain the country’s poorest and most marginalised group. Persistent poverty also characterises the lives of bumiputera minorities in Sabah and Sarawak, in part due to neglect and in part because of the inability of conventional approaches to reach these groups due to inaccessibility and other structural constraints. In the case of the Indians, the changes in the plantation sector have rendered very large numbers homeless and forced these unskilled people to eke out a precarious living in the urban areas.
27/01/10
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