Parliament meeting should not be held on eve of Deepavali

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Today we caled for a press conference at Parliament lobby to ask for the cancellation of Parliamentary sitting scheduled on the eve of Deepavali.

YAB Lim Guan Eng, Prof Ramasamy,YB Manogran, YB Chong Eng,YB Fong Kui Lun ,YB Sim Tong Him together voiced our unhappiness on the scheduled meeting .

Among the reasons I gave are as follows:

When launching the 1Malaysia India Students Movement at Universiti Malaya in July this year, Prime Minister Dato Sri Najib Razak announced that public higher educational institutions would
revamp its curriculum and examination schedules this year to ensure that it did not clash with Deepavali and allow the Indian students to celebrate festival.

Najib was quoted to have said the decision would resolve the two-decade old problem affecting Indian students, who had to miss the celebration as their examination almost always fall either a day before or even on the day of the festival.

This was certainly an announcement which was most welcomed.

However, one can’t help but wonder if it were not because of the last general election result where Barisan Nasional lost its traditional Indian support, the government would ever bothered to resolve such a simple problem.

This year’s Deepavali falls on October 26th. I am therefore surprised that Parliament meeting has been scheduled on October 25, the eve of Deepavali.

DAP hereby calls on the Prime Minister who is the Government leader in the House to cancel the October 25th meeting as it is a practice for Hindus to pray to their ancestors on the eve of Deepavali and once a year reunion with family members.

To make matters worse, the traffic will be heavy on all main roads on Oct 25, thus it will be a hassle for all of us. Further more ,we have to prepare for the Deepavali open house which will be on the 26th.

This could well be an oversight but it certainly reflects the need for government officers who are involved in planning meetings to have better knowledge of all festivals in the country.

This morning YB Manogaran and I met Minister Dato Seri Nazri and Speaker Tan Sri Pandikar and requested them to vacate Oct 25 as a Parliamentary meeting day. Both have agreed to consider our request favorably and will revert soon.

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