It is preposterous for Joe to attack our beloved Bapa Malaysia and rely on colonial distortions of history in his letter 'Preposterous to say PM ashamed of Indian roots' (Jan 2).

He has revealed himself to be a racist and anti-Malay Malaysian who needs re-education for Vision 2020 and Bangsa Malaysia.

He betrays the positive traits of the far-sighted Tunku and Dr Mahathir, whatever their faults may be.

Let me humbly rebut some of the things he said.

Dr Mahathir felt bad because his father, a first generation Indian Malaysian, was not accepted as a Malay and bumiputra by the Malay leaders of his time.

Dr Mahathir, it is often said, was very close to his loving mother and wanted to be a Malay and hence, citizen of the land.

Mind you, at that time being a potential citizen of independent Malaysia with citizenship rights meant being a Malay.

Tunku being part Thai on his mother Che Menjalara's side was not much of a bother to Malays at that time because many Thais were bumiputras and citizens of Kedah, his and Dr Mahathir's home state.

As for Tun Razak being part Dutch, this is news to many. Thanks for the information.

Most of us know he was part Orang Asli Malay, part Bugis (the tribal family which inhabits Eastern Indonesia, which originated from Sabah's Bajau tribe family), and part North Indian.

To speak of Malays as immigrants from the islands of Indonesia is a colonial concoction that shows the highest level of ignorance.

Indonesia only came into existence in 1945 when Dutch East Indies became independent. The republic was an artificial construct of:

Before the coming of the Dutch, there was only an ancient Malaysia covering the Peninsula and all the Malaysian islands which today form Indonesia, East Timor, Brunei and the Philippines.

Migration was free between the Peninsula and all these islands. People were not boundary conscious.

This ancient Malaysia was named by the Indians as such, because it was inhabited by people of the Malay-Dayak stock who originated from the Himalayas (hence the name Malaya).

It is ridiculous to say the Thais owned the Peninsula. The Malays were here long before the Thais, who only came to the region in the1200s, when the Chinese and Tibetans pushed them out of Tibet and Southern China.

The Malays, both Proto and Deutero, were the people living in the Peninsula at the time of burgeoning Indian and Chinese trade.

Kedah was a kingdom of the Mandailings or Bataks, who originally lived in Myanmar before the Tibetan Myanmars, and were pushed there and into Aceh and Medan of Sumatra.

Kelantan was a kingdom of the Champa who originally lived in Vietnam before the Khmer-related Vietnamese, and had three kingdoms, namely Champa covering Central and South Vietnam, Patani covering Segenting Kra, and Kelantan.

The rest of the Peninsula and Sumatra was under the old kingdom of Selangor, also called Sri Vijaya, with two capitals, in Klang and Palembang (not to be confused with modern Selangor).

Mainland Selangor in Klang and island Selangor in Palembang later split.

Mainland Selangor later moved its capital from Klang to Singapore and finally Malacca, where the city's name became the new name for the kingdom.

A Thai-appointed Orang Asli Malay collaborator, Temagi, not the crown prince, was the man Parameswara killed in Singapore.

Parameswara killed him when he was thwarting an attempt by the Thais to claim the island, which was one of mainland Selangor's capitals.

Malacca's history is one of constant attempts to fight off Thai expansionism with Chinese and Indian military help.

However, the Thais conquered Kedah (then including Perlis), Kelantan and Terengganu.

The Malay nationalism concept was very much a Malay construct, and it was one that the ancient kings of Selangor and Malacca bore on their shoulders.

Both Hang Tuah and Hang Jebat, defence ministers of Malacca of Bugis and Orang Asli Malay stock, were upholders of that nationalism.

The old Malaysia was the Peninsula, Patani, Champa, and the whole of island Southeast Asia.

This was the realm of the king of Selangor/Sri Vijaya based in Klang and Palembang, and later the Malacca ruler, his successor, whose capitals were Malacca, Klang, Pahang (Pekan) and Johor (Johor Lama).

Most, if not all, freedom fighters since then, spoke of the glorious Sri Vijaya and Malacca as the basis of the Malay nation.