Friday, October 23, 2009

No Telugu programmes for Deepavali over Astro

It is truly sad and a disturbing Deepavali Sunday for all Malaysian Telugus. ASTRO shows its discrimination once again against the minorities in Malaysia particularly the Telugus. In spite of repeated appeals and request from Telugu viewers and the Telugu Association of Malaysia. ASTRO has turn deaf hear. There was no Telugu slot at all for Telugus who celebrated Deepavali on Saturday(17/10/09). Even the Sunday normal Telugu programmes slots were completely taken away which is the next day of Deepavali.

The PM calls for 1 Malaysia that is to accept and respect all cultural, religious and linguistic values by all Malaysian appears have not reached to ASTRO. I believe 1 Malaysia is not only focused on Malays, Chinese and Tamils in this country but also minorities like Telugus, Malayali, Punjabis and others.

Deepavali, a festival celebrated by all Hindus in the world but Astro is projecting as though if it belongs to only our Tamils brothers and sisters.

From the day of independence, the Telugu society had never once let down to give its sincere and strong support to the Ruling Government party. The community has strived to excel in all walks of life and contributed in many ways to the development and peace of this country for all most a century. The Telugu community has been a peaceful citizen and posed no burden to the government in any way.

Obviously, until today the close to 300K Telugu populations in Malaysia was not given a fair attention and the privilege and one of it is to view much of their mother tongue programmes.

It has been decades the responsible broadcasting Medias failed to fulfill the cries of the Telugu community in this country. Over private TV Astro which has 6 channels to cater for Indian views but very sadden that only 4 Telugu moives on sundays 4.00pm-6.30pm;mondays 1100am -1.30pm, wednesdays 2.00 am- 4.30 am & Thursday 4.00 pm - 6.30pm and a drama serial of the 4 repeated serials are shown for every week but whatever appealing and begging them, but unheard.

Annually RTM promised and even issued letter to WP/Selangor branch (Sri A Appanah Naidu was the chairman of the WP/Selangor branch, then) to telecast 3 Telugu films over TV 2. But to date, only 1 Telugu movie is shown during Telugu New Year. While TV 3 and Ntv 7 almost nil on Telugu programmes. And over Radio completely no Telugu slot on Sundays over Minnal Radio.

In many occasions, either directly or indirectly we have been deprived the rights to even enjoy basic entertainment in our own mother tongue via the public and private broadcasting TV stations. Even attempts after attempts we merely face negligence with unconvincingly feeble excuses from responsible quarters. Looking at the way this community is positioned we foresee the society on the track of mere extinction.To this issue, it is only fair to ask as a minority group like the Telugus in this country should be allowed to see their mother-tongue languages programmes over Satellite Tv being allowed. Anyway, there are thousand illegal satellite dishes around the country.

Looking at the reality, why not make legal for minority groups such as Telugus to view Satellite Tv?

“Hilang Bahasa Hilang Bangsa” dan “ Rakyat didahulukan Pencapaian diutamakan”
Reference: Dr Achaiah- TAM

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