For the People

I believe strongly in motivating people to alleviate poverty. I am a believer of the Grameen Bank style of micro credit aid. When timely assistance is given to the p00r they are able to break the cycle of poverty.

The Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia or AIM micro credit assiatance programme was started in 1987 in Malaysia. However I was instrumental in introducing this programme for the very first time to poor Indians, especially single mothers, in 2000. This was a major breakthrough for me as well as the poor Indians.

The credit assistance programme was initially launched in June 2000 with a capital of RM200,000. As of the year 2004, 535 Indian women had obtained loans worth 1,136,000 through this micro credit scheme which has helped them to start their own small businesses.

The AIM credit assistance programme is on-going and by 2006,  770 Indian women have received RM 1, 866,020. With the success of this programme I am eager to continue this scheme on a large scale in the future.

A computer literacy programme was introduced to 1200 Indian grassroots leaders across the country to enable them to be more efficient. Not wanting the them to be strangers to the IT revolution,  on 27 May 2006, I launched the CYBER START programme. This  initiative was to serve as an introduction to the usage of computers  for the non-computer savvy Indians.

The national scale project involved a budget of more than half a million ringgit.

I have a passion for traditional skills that live silently in communities. I have always wanted to develop and sustain these skills so that they are not lost to future generations. I got my chance when I met the Indian potters.

Pottery is a traditional skill in the Indian community. In May 2001 I identified 27 families from Kedah, Selangor, Perak and Malacca who were all in the pottery business. The heads of these families attended a 15 day training course on how to use modern technology for their business and enhance their craft. More than RM400,000 was used for this course. Subsequently I managed to obtain a RM1,000,000 special allocation directly from the then Prime Minister to serve as a revolving fund for the training and development of Indian potters.

As soon as I joined the Rural Development Ministry, I initiated a survey/research study to identify problems that affected Indians who tend to be displaced due to the development of estates. Rubber and palm oil estates were being sold, fragmented and taken up for various kinds of developments or projects which did not give due emphasis on how the Indians who lived in these places were to be ‘rehabilitated’. This study was conducted by a team headed by Prof D Ramasamy (now second Chief Minister of Penang) of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia with an allocation of RM150,000. The study provided the necessary data for my community development projects.

My first government post in 1995 was as Parliamentary Secretary to the then Ministry of National Unity and Community Development. I realized the role this ministry could play in alleviating many of the welfare related problems that plague the poor in Malaysia. Often a major illness in a family can break the economic backbone of that family. The family gets burdened by huge medical bills and in a matter of time is swallowed by debts.

The Ministry had several ‘schemes’ by which to lessen the burden of such people and many were not aware of such an avenue of where they could turn for help. So I went on a ‘publicity drive’ to create awareness amongst target groups by organising seminars and workshops. I started off in my constituency and later spread the word to other areas of the country. The response to my ‘bringing the government to the people’ was very good and in a matter of a few months the ministry was able to render substantial help to many deserving people. Since then my work in that area has not stopped!

For example, from April 2004 to September 2005, my office had handled 3,500 cases, out of which 920 cases were welfare related.

Of these 354 cases were solved when the applicants received amounts worth RM16, 490,233 through Jabatan Kebajikan Masyarakat (JKM).

A further 26 people received subsidies worth RM 555, 143.67 for treatment from Institut Jantung Negara (IJN) while hospital fees for 34 cases were waived.

In addition to these, through the Yayasan Kebajikan Negara (YKN), my office received financial aid worth RM 290,934.94 for 34 cases.

These are just examples of the type of aid and help given through my work in one very short period – that is between April 2004 to September 2005.

To highlight the statistics on Indians, as of 2008, more than RM50 million (RM50, 363, 752) in welfare aid has been given to Indians through the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development. When I started out with the Ministry in 2004, the Indians had received about RM 20 million.