INTERVIEW The MIC lost its relevance in politics and to the Indian community as far back as 1974, said National Indian Rights Action Team (Niat) chairperson Thasleem Mohd Ibrahim.

"It started becoming irrelevant much earlier, but (former MIC president) S Samy Vellu had his own way of making the party appear relevant," Thasleem told Malaysiakini in an interview last week.

His statement contrasts with the popular view that S Samy Vellu , who assumed office in 1979, was the cause of MIC's downfall, culminating in the 2007 Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) rally , which brought some 30,000 protesters onto the streets of Kuala Lumpur.

Thasleem, a long-time Tamil education activist, claimed that the MIC in 1974 forwarded a memorandum to the Cabinet Committee on Education, but its proposals got nowhere.

The memorandum, he said, called for the upgrading of Tamil schools and syllabi, better teacher training and residential schools to be set up to "enable Indian students to overcome the debilitating effects of their socio-economic environment."