When mathematics prodigy 15-year-old Sufiah Yusof made newspaper headlines in local and British press recently, my thoughts wander to yet another genius, much closer to home.

But how many Malaysians still remember a boy named Chiang Ti Meng?

Just about 10 years ago, in the little town of Seremban, capital of Negri Sembilan (I'm stating this to remind Malaysians that not only London datelined episodes make heart-rending stories), was a local born, bred and schooled reaching a milestone of his life. At the age 12 when most pupils would move from primary to secondary school, fresh-faced and experiencing the first stirrings of puberty, Ti Meng was poised for university studies.

But there was a problem ... when the Malaysian government agency awarding scholarships was approached for help, Ti Meng and family were told he did not qualify for a scholarship since he did not go through the "normal" schooling system, including the fact that he did not sit for the SRP and SPM exams taken in the third and fifth year of secondary study.

If Ti Meng had to go through a "normal" routine of five years in secondary school (from age 12 to 16), he would not have taken his pre-university examinations at a private a school at the tender age of 12, would he?

So we have education officials with questionable IQ shoo-ing (or is it shooting?) off a young lad whose asset of having an IQ befitting a genius is now classified as a liability. It is definitely not a nice Malaysian "feeling" to be dismissed on such spurious grounds to merit a scholarship.

By its very definition, "scholarship" means outstanding performance in academic pursuit, and by any standard and measure, Ti Meng fulfilled all the requirements of "scholarship" with his straight As at pre-university exams.

Bureaucrats hiding behind cowardly political masters with no ....s mouthing boneless officialspeak to deprive a potential first Malaysian Nobel Prize winner of some assistance ... this really makes all feeling and caring Malaysians vomit, puke ... please add one whatever from your rich vocabulary.

And we all know the Public Service Department hands out thousands of scholarships for tertiary studies overseas to less than "deserving" students, and they felt it not befitting to give one to a potential Nobel laureate! Oh, poor Ti Meng, punished for performing ahead of his time when we trumpet Vision 2020 so loudly across this country nicknamed Bolehland !

The "poor" lad was then escorted around by a few "kind" politicians (no prize for guessing right from which party!) soliciting funds for a promising young Malaysian to study in the United States.

I believe Ti Meng went on to study Physics at Cornell University, proceeding to a PhD at Harvard. His father, an engineer working at an electronics firm in Seremban (if I am not mistaken, as I am mainly relying on my mental archives to tell this tale) had to resign from his job to accompany his child to the US to oversee junior's studies.

A sidebar to this less than lifting tale was a tragedy befalling the Chiang family ... Ti Meng's mother, a school teacher, was at a club reception one night with a daughter of four years (Mr Chiang was not present as he was still in the US) when the kid strolled off from her mum's side. The little girl was found drowned at the club's swimming pool after a frantic search.

Maths prodigy

Back to Sufiah ... the only Malaysian connection was that her mother was born in Muar, Johor. Based on this connection which was nebulous and tenuous, to my mind, the really responsible corporate Sime Darby jumped onto the limelight by awarding the maths prodigy a scholarship when Sufiah's academic performance made news headlines some years ago.

The rest of the happenings that followed are not relevant here except for a fact revealed along the way that Sufiah's father, Farouk Yusof, had achieved a criminal record. How did this escape Sime Darby's vetting or was no vetting required because of Sufiah's potential to become "our" proud first Nobel laureate?

What happened to all the corporations who have very "patriotic" sounding mission statements announcing their national commitment as responsible corporate citizens when Chiang Ti Meng broke onto the local news scene some years ago?

Where was Sime Darby then? Where were Petronas, Genting, Telekom, Renong, Multi-Purpose, Berjaya? Saw nothing, heard nothing, anything to say now?

Maybe Ti Meng's fate would have been different if only his mother was born in Seremban and then migrated to the US, met her husband there and gave birth to Ti Meng on foreign shores?

Recently, we saw MCA ministers doing a song and dance after succeeding to reverse the "rejection by universities" of a large number of students with 10As, 9As and 8As. In the first place, the problem came from the government of which MCA is a supposedly key component.

The minister in charge of science has made countless appeals to Malaysian scientists overseas to return home (yet acknowledging we can only pay "peanuts") to contribute their expertise to move Malaysia to developed nation status by 2020.

And none less than Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi just a few days ago also urged successful Malaysians living abroad to return and invest at home.

But we have lost young talented Malaysians like Ti Meng because we did not care at the right time. We prefer to care for others for the wrong reasons.

I can only end with the sad refrain from Peter, Paul and Mary:

"When will they ever learn, Oh, when will they ever learn?"