KUALA LUMPUR: The government must not lump Indians in the non-Bumiputera category, but fix the number of Public Service Department (PSD) scholarships for the community, MIC information chief Datuk M. Saravanan said yesterday.

He said under the present system, of the 2,000 PSD scholarships awarded annually, 55 per cent was allocated for Bumiputeras and the remaining 45 per cent for non-Bumiputeras.

"Out of the 900 PSD scholarships for non-Bumiputeras, Indians initially received only 34, which was then increased to 70. We are now awaiting the results of about 180 appeal cases.

"The Indians are already backward in terms of education, but yet we have to compete with all the other non-Bumis. The government should allocate, on an annual basis, 250 PSD scholarships for Indians," Saravanan, who is also Federal Territories Deputy Minister, said.

"The current selection system is also flawed. The exam results constitute 70 per cent of the eligibility marks for the PSD scholarships. The rest is made up of the interview and such, which is very subjective.

"The people want transparency. If a student is the best, then he or she must be eligible for the scholarship. Now, we have students who have scored excellent marks but turned down by the PSD on the pretext that they failed in the interview.

"That half-an-hour interview decides a student's fate. It might have taken students five years or more to obtain excellent results. Is that fair? It is not a level playing field." - Bernama