The attacks on Indian students in Australia
Richard WongPublished: Jul 3, 2009 10:24 AM | Updated: Jul 3, 2009 10:48 AM
In recent months there has been much news about a spate of brutal attacks on Indian overseas students. These have especially occurred in Melbourne, although there have been cases in other cities. Many of the attacks have been vicious.
In recent months there has been much news about a spate of brutal attacks on Indian overseas students. These have especially occurred in Melbourne, although there have been cases in other cities. Many of the attacks have been vicious.
In recent months there has been much news about a spate of brutal attacks on Indian overseas students. These have especially occurred in Melbourne, although there have been cases in other cities. Many of the attacks have been vicious.
One student lost an eye, another was stabbed with a screwdriver. Location of attacks has been mostly on evening trains and in station surounds, often as students are returning home from their campus.
The Indian Students' Federation in Australia have been active in organising protests about lack of action by the authorities to better protect the students.
It has become a lively issue in the Indian media and the Indian government has made protests to the Australian government.
There has been dismay amongst the Indian students and many others about the slow and half-hearted response of the police, education authorities and governments.
The educational institutions seem to be amazingly quiet on the safety of their overseas students. They don't seem to have played any advocacy role.
The Victorian Police Commissioner, Simon Overland, at first responded to the attacks by claming that there was nothing to suggest that Indians were being singled out or targeted for the crimes.
Unfortunately there were many such attacks on people of all backgrounds, he said. It was just that the Indian student victims were getting all the publicity.
The attacks were 'opportunist' robbery, not racist assault.
The only factor that could make an Indian student a little more of a target was that they tended to carry items of attraction, such as ipods, laptops and mobile phones.
His key point was that the attacks on the Indian students were not out of proportion to the students' share of the general population.
Only as the attacks worsened and the Indian students came out to stage demonstrations in Melbourne and Sydney did the Police Commissioner admit that the attacks were racially motivated.
Challenge to Australia's foreign relations
Victorian Premier John Brumby has acknowledged the seriousness of the situation and taken a very positive initiative to lead a Harmony Walk on Sunday, July 12 at 1pm.
At the national level, it was really only when the Indian government protested strongly and the matter got extensive coverage in the Indian media that the Australian government started to take notice.
Calls in the Indian media for families to start bringing their young people home from Australia - and perhaps re-locate them in other countries where they would be better protected - helped focus Australian attention on the problem.
The whole thing has become a challenge to Australia's foreign relations.
Education exports (selling of school and tertiary places at very high prices to overseas students) is now the third largest Australian export earner after minerals and agricultural products.
It is no sideline business. Earnings to Australia from education exports now total about $16 billion each year. In Victoria it provides more than $3 billion. Australian foreign policy simply cannot go on in such a cynical and self-serving way.
It cannot say to Asian countries and peoples send us your young people for secondary and tertiary education, fund a large proportion of our total education bill, but don't expect us to offer them protection when they come under physical attack.
The attacks on the Indian students has further opened up a range of other fundamental issues about Australian tertiary education.
As Australian governments - Labor and Liberal - have increasingly shifted the cost of tertiary education away from government budgets and on to earnings from overseas student fees, all sorts of negative outcomes have emerged.
There is the emergence of some very questionable private providers, the selling of fake "Australian tertiary qualifications" in some overseas markets, the rise of conmen and fraudsters in and around the tertiary institutions collecting phoney "fees" and charges from the overseas students, that go straight into their own crooked pockets.
The Federal government has yet to publicly acknowledge the existence of such malpractices. The Department of Immigration may have conducted some investigations on its own immediate matters (visas, residency, and so on) but not on the eradication of the fraudulent practices themselves.
Huge influx of overseas students
The Federal (and state) governments have a clear duty to clean up these criminal elements. To let it all go means that the quality and integrity of the overseas student programme will just slip away.
Above all, it is this drop in the standard of many first degree and postgraduate courses that makes up the most serious outcome of the current entrepreneurial culture in tertiary education. The cause of this quality loss probably has much to do with declining employment conditions for university teachers.
There is less permanent academic employment, heavier workloads and very stretched budgets. There has been a general unpreparedness for the huge influx of overseas students into the total campus population.
This overall entrepreneurial culture of the modern Australian university seems to have weakened its teaching quality and perhaps even its research. The milk from the education export cow is being taken on a grand scale, but the milk has turned sour.
The attacks on the Indian students have slowed a bit over recent weeks. Let's hope governments and police don't drop their guard, until one day the attacks break out even more violently than before.
All the issues of the oveaseas student programme ("education exports") need to be reviewed comprehensively - looking after the safety of the 400,000 overseas student residents in Australia, better meeting their housing needs and providing adequate services, reducing the ridiculously high fees for overseas students, reviewing the the accreditation processes for all "educational" institutions and facing up to the declining quality in many of the academic courses and research programmes offered.
Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard has undertaken to have a review done. It must be comprehensive and show commitment to promoting a fair and genuine relationship, based on mutual benefit, with the neighbouring countries and peoples.
The review needs to get moving without delay.
One student lost an eye, another was stabbed with a screwdriver. Location of attacks has been mostly on evening trains and in station surounds, often as students are returning home from their campus.
The Indian Students' Federation in Australia have been active in organising protests about lack of action by the authorities to better protect the students.
It has become a lively issue in the Indian media and the Indian government has made protests to the Australian government.
There has been dismay amongst the Indian students and many others about the slow and half-hearted response of the police, education authorities and governments.
The educational institutions seem to be amazingly quiet on the safety of their overseas students. They don't seem to have played any advocacy role.The Victorian Police Commissioner, Simon Overland, at first responded to the attacks by claming that there was nothing to suggest that Indians were being singled out or targeted for the crimes.
Unfortunately there were many such attacks on people of all backgrounds, he said. It was just that the Indian student victims were getting all the publicity.
The attacks were 'opportunist' robbery, not racist assault.
The only factor that could make an Indian student a little more of a target was that they tended to carry items of attraction, such as ipods, laptops and mobile phones.
His key point was that the attacks on the Indian students were not out of proportion to the students' share of the general population.
Only as the attacks worsened and the Indian students came out to stage demonstrations in Melbourne and Sydney did the Police Commissioner admit that the attacks were racially motivated.
Challenge to Australia's foreign relations
Victorian Premier John Brumby has acknowledged the seriousness of the situation and taken a very positive initiative to lead a Harmony Walk on Sunday, July 12 at 1pm.
At the national level, it was really only when the Indian government protested strongly and the matter got extensive coverage in the Indian media that the Australian government started to take notice.
Calls in the Indian media for families to start bringing their young people home from Australia - and perhaps re-locate them in other countries where they would be better protected - helped focus Australian attention on the problem.
The whole thing has become a challenge to Australia's foreign relations.
Education exports (selling of school and tertiary places at very high prices to overseas students) is now the third largest Australian export earner after minerals and agricultural products.
It is no sideline business. Earnings to Australia from education exports now total about $16 billion each year. In Victoria it provides more than $3 billion. Australian foreign policy simply cannot go on in such a cynical and self-serving way.It cannot say to Asian countries and peoples send us your young people for secondary and tertiary education, fund a large proportion of our total education bill, but don't expect us to offer them protection when they come under physical attack.
The attacks on the Indian students has further opened up a range of other fundamental issues about Australian tertiary education.
As Australian governments - Labor and Liberal - have increasingly shifted the cost of tertiary education away from government budgets and on to earnings from overseas student fees, all sorts of negative outcomes have emerged.
There is the emergence of some very questionable private providers, the selling of fake "Australian tertiary qualifications" in some overseas markets, the rise of conmen and fraudsters in and around the tertiary institutions collecting phoney "fees" and charges from the overseas students, that go straight into their own crooked pockets.
The Federal government has yet to publicly acknowledge the existence of such malpractices. The Department of Immigration may have conducted some investigations on its own immediate matters (visas, residency, and so on) but not on the eradication of the fraudulent practices themselves.
Huge influx of overseas students
The Federal (and state) governments have a clear duty to clean up these criminal elements. To let it all go means that the quality and integrity of the overseas student programme will just slip away.
Above all, it is this drop in the standard of many first degree and postgraduate courses that makes up the most serious outcome of the current entrepreneurial culture in tertiary education. The cause of this quality loss probably has much to do with declining employment conditions for university teachers.
There is less permanent academic employment, heavier workloads and very stretched budgets. There has been a general unpreparedness for the huge influx of overseas students into the total campus population.
This overall entrepreneurial culture of the modern Australian university seems to have weakened its teaching quality and perhaps even its research. The milk from the education export cow is being taken on a grand scale, but the milk has turned sour.The attacks on the Indian students have slowed a bit over recent weeks. Let's hope governments and police don't drop their guard, until one day the attacks break out even more violently than before.
All the issues of the oveaseas student programme ("education exports") need to be reviewed comprehensively - looking after the safety of the 400,000 overseas student residents in Australia, better meeting their housing needs and providing adequate services, reducing the ridiculously high fees for overseas students, reviewing the the accreditation processes for all "educational" institutions and facing up to the declining quality in many of the academic courses and research programmes offered.
Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard has undertaken to have a review done. It must be comprehensive and show commitment to promoting a fair and genuine relationship, based on mutual benefit, with the neighbouring countries and peoples.
The review needs to get moving without delay.
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