Subscribe in a reader | Subscribe by Email As I mentioned earlier, there’s more to it than meets the eye for this MIC Youth’s tour. Read the following article by NST that mentions a new group “Sekretariat Sukarelawan BN”.
Calling all ‘stateless’ Indians to roadshow
KUALA LUMPUR: There will be sweet relief over the Chinese New Year holidays for Indians without birth certificates and identity cards.
MIC Youth social and welfare bureau chief T. Mohan and 50 volunteers will embark on a roadshow from Thursday to Feb 10 to put them on the road to obtaining these documents. He said the “BCIC Special Operations Unit” would visit 20 locations in eight states. They will visit Selangor (on Thursday), Kedah and Penang (Friday), Perak and Pahang (Saturday) and Johor, Malacca and Negri Sembilan (Feb 10).
“We will also tackle cases of Malaysian Indians who were given permanent resident status due to technical errors and have been waiting for years to rectify the problem,” he said.
The roadshow took off at the MIC headquarters yesterday where some 30 “stateless” people were offered assistance on procedures to obtain the documents.
On the choice of the Chinese New Year holidays for the roadshow, he said it made it easier for those working as well as the volunteers.
Mohan advised the “stateless” not to fall prey to those who asked for money to settle their problems.”We will be helping them on a case-by-case basis,” he said adding that those without these documents should call 019-2119547 or 016-6100846.
D. Sivanesan, 26, said although his parents and siblings had identity cards, he could not obtain one even though he had a birth certificate. “I applied for a birth certificate late and only got it four years ago. I applied for an IC then and am still waiting for it. I hope that with the MIC’s help, I can get it soon,” he said.
Meanwhile, a group calling itself “Sekretariat Sukarelawan BN” has urged “stateless” people in Selangor to attend a briefing at the Dewan Datuk Hamzah in Klang at 9am on Tuesday on information on how to apply for the documents.
Spokesman R. Sivapragasam said National Registration Department officials would be present to attend to queries. “They should bring whatever documents they have along to prove that they were born in Malaysia,” he added. To date, the secretariat has received more than 2,000 calls from “stateless” Indians. “We sent out the message through text messages and emails and we are taken aback by the response,” he said.
