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Monday 18 January 2010
Aussies slam KKK cartoon in Indian daily
Australia’s government and police angrily criticised yesterday a cartoon in an Indian newspaper that depicted police as racist Ku Klux Klan (KKK) members following the fatal stabbing of an Indian national.
Victoria cops depicted as racist after murder of young Indian man
Reuters 09 January 2010
CANBERRA: Australia’s government and police angrily criticised yesterday a cartoon in an Indian newspaper that depicted police as racist Ku Klux Klan (KKK) members following the fatal stabbing of an Indian national.
India’s Mail Today ran the cartoon showing a figure wearing a pointed white hood and a Victoria state police badge against a black background and the words: ‘We are yet to ascertain the nature of the crime.’
The Klan was an infamous white supremacist hate group that had much influence in America during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The cartoon came following the stabbing death of 21-year-old Indian national Nitin Garg in Melbourne last weekend.
The media in India has accused Australian police of not doing enough to solve the murder of Mr. Garg, an accounting graduate originally from the state of Punjab in northern India. He was stabbed while on his way to work at a fast-food outlet in Melbourne.
‘To say that our detectives are going slow on this, or for some reason trying to protect somebody, is incredibly offensive and wrong,’ said Mr. Greg Davies, secretary of the Victoria Police Association, the police officers’ union.
Acting Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the police were doing an outstanding job investigating Mr. Garg’s murder and a series of attacks on Indian students in Melbourne and Sydney last year that drew diplomatic protests and travel warnings from New Delhi.
‘Any suggestion of the kind is deeply offensive, and I would condemn the making of such comment,’ she said.
The attacks have already damaged Australia’s lucrative foreign student market, which is the country’s third-largest export earner, behind coal and iron ore, worth A$13 billion (S$16.6 billion) in 2007-2008.
The number of Indian students wanting to study in Australia plummeted by 46 per cent between July and October last year, according to Australian immigration department figures released this week. South Asians account for 19 per cent of international students in Australia.
The Indian media has labelled the attacks as racist, but police and the government Down Under have insisted the attacks are purely criminal.
‘The identity of the offender from the homicide isn’t even known at this stage, so we don’t even know what nationality the offender is. To say it’s a race-based crime is not only premature but stupid,’ Mr. Davies told Australian radio.
The state police force made no comment on the cartoon, but the union representing the state’s officers said the drawing was based on nothing but ‘a slow news day in Delhi’.
The editor of Mail Today defended the cartoon saying it reflected the mood in the country. ‘We perceive the Melbourne police to be a racist organisation simply because it seems it is not acting fast enough, or seriously enough, on the attacks on Indian students,’ Mr. Bharat Bhushan said.
But Victoria Police Minister Bob Cameron said the state police is a very tolerant organisation. ‘To suggest that Victoria Police is racist is just plain wrong,’ he said.
The controversy resonated among Australians, some of whom were furious. A caller at the 3AW radio station, who identified herself as Molly, said accusing each other of racism has detracted from the plain reality that there is a crime to be dealt with.
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Aussies slam KKK cartoon in Indian daily
Victoria cops depicted as racist after murder of young Indian man
Reuters
09 January 2010
CANBERRA: Australia’s government and police angrily criticised yesterday a cartoon in an Indian newspaper that depicted police as racist Ku Klux Klan (KKK) members following the fatal stabbing of an Indian national.
India’s Mail Today ran the cartoon showing a figure wearing a pointed white hood and a Victoria state police badge against a black background and the words: ‘We are yet to ascertain the nature of the crime.’
The Klan was an infamous white supremacist hate group that had much influence in America during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The cartoon came following the stabbing death of 21-year-old Indian national Nitin Garg in Melbourne last weekend.
The media in India has accused Australian police of not doing enough to solve the murder of Mr. Garg, an accounting graduate originally from the state of Punjab in northern India. He was stabbed while on his way to work at a fast-food outlet in Melbourne.
‘To say that our detectives are going slow on this, or for some reason trying to protect somebody, is incredibly offensive and wrong,’ said Mr. Greg Davies, secretary of the Victoria Police Association, the police officers’ union.
Acting Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the police were doing an outstanding job investigating Mr. Garg’s murder and a series of attacks on Indian students in Melbourne and Sydney last year that drew diplomatic protests and travel warnings from New Delhi.
‘Any suggestion of the kind is deeply offensive, and I would condemn the making of such comment,’ she said.
The attacks have already damaged Australia’s lucrative foreign student market, which is the country’s third-largest export earner, behind coal and iron ore, worth A$13 billion (S$16.6 billion) in 2007-2008.
The number of Indian students wanting to study in Australia plummeted by 46 per cent between July and October last year, according to Australian immigration department figures released this week. South Asians account for 19 per cent of international students in Australia.
The Indian media has labelled the attacks as racist, but police and the government Down Under have insisted the attacks are purely criminal.
‘The identity of the offender from the homicide isn’t even known at this stage, so we don’t even know what nationality the offender is. To say it’s a race-based crime is not only premature but stupid,’ Mr. Davies told Australian radio.
The state police force made no comment on the cartoon, but the union representing the state’s officers said the drawing was based on nothing but ‘a slow news day in Delhi’.
The editor of Mail Today defended the cartoon saying it reflected the mood in the country. ‘We perceive the Melbourne police to be a racist organisation simply because it seems it is not acting fast enough, or seriously enough, on the attacks on Indian students,’ Mr. Bharat Bhushan said.
But Victoria Police Minister Bob Cameron said the state police is a very tolerant organisation. ‘To suggest that Victoria Police is racist is just plain wrong,’ he said.
The controversy resonated among Australians, some of whom were furious. A caller at the 3AW radio station, who identified herself as Molly, said accusing each other of racism has detracted from the plain reality that there is a crime to be dealt with.
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