I am responding to the Malaysiakini article ‘10-year-old caned over non-halal food in school’ on Nov 5.

This shows that political correctness has gone overboard like what the poor 10-year-old child had to endure. This incident shows that the kid is the innocent party while the senior assistant is the intolerant, disrespectful person.

The child was bringing the non-halal sausages to school for his personal consumption at recess time. He was not going to use the sausages to pollute his classroom or anything.

This sad incident that happened in Kuching shows that if we allow intolerant people like this senior assistant to get away scot-free, this so-called 'halal' mentality will create a big divide between the Muslims and non-Muslims of Malaysia.

Moreover, the 'halal' political correctness will deny non-Malays their rights to have non-halal things for their personal use.

If we allow this senior assistant to get away unpunished, we are doing an injustice not only for the kid and his mother, but also for other non-Muslims just like them.

It is high time people like the senior assistant understand that they share the air with the non-Muslims and non-halal animals.

We should not need this whole political correctness surrounding what is halal and what is not, to stop us non-Muslims from doing what is acceptable for our personal use.