I must admit that I can't agree more with S Sivanesan regarding the plight of the Indian community ('The colour purple', May 3). They are totally marginalised, and I don't see any ray of light for them, not in the near future that's for sure.

Being a graduate from a local varsity, I myself had seen much of the injustices when it comes to educational opportunities. There were plenty of my bumiputra friends who were completing their bachelor's degree with me despite being mediocre students, and most of them should not be there at the first place.

Upon graduating, I discovered some other friends who were successfully accepted to serve as government officers even though their grades were not as good as those who were vying for the similar position. All these were done by the virtue of 'orang dalam' (insiders). Not only do we have the bumiputra and non-bumiputra system, it looks like there are some bumiputras that are more 'bumiputra' than the rest.

Being a Malay, I don't think that I am going to have any problems playing on a level field. I accept friends of mine as Malaysian regardless of their colour and belief. This is our country, and I am willing to share everything I have with fellow Malaysians.

But, for all of my readiness, I must stress here that there's no way that I will consider myself as an 'immigrant from Indonesia'. I am a Malay on a peninsula historically and geographically referred to as a part of the Malay Archipelago. I am not an immigrant for there were no Indonesia or Malaysia many, many years ago, just the Malay Archipelago with various kingdoms.

Whatever sort of injustices and discriminations being practised, let's just think, discuss and work our way to end them. Calling us 'immigrants' is clearly not a good start at all, for it involves pride, dignity and honour worth dying for. No compromise on that.