Organisers of an anti-riot exercise in Singapore defended their decision to use South Asian migrant workers in the simulation following accusations of racism, a media report said today.

Photos shared by Minister of National Development Khaw Boon Wan on his Facebook page on Tuesday showed South Asian migrant workers taking part in a riot exercise where they shouted at a row of riot police, and were then subdued and arrested.

“We have a few foreign workers’ dormitories. What if some quarrels erupt, leading to fights or worse? These are possible scenarios, given the concentration of foreign workers in one locality,” Khaw wrote.

The post drew accusations of racism.

“Positing Indian foreign workers as the next group of rioters or troublemakers does not paint racial minority groups in a positive light but only perpetuates existing stereotypes which are inimical to the development of a harmonious society,” wrote one commentator on the minister’s Facebook page.

V Manimaran, operations manager of Wee Chwee Huat Scaffolding and Construction Company - the dormitory operator that helped organise the exercise - rebuffed the criticism, saying that Bangladeshi and Indian workers were chosen because they make up almost all the workers employed by the company, the Straits Times reported today.

The workers were asked to follow a script where a riot was sparked because of unhappiness over living conditions.

“I am Indian and I wrote the script. I did not find it racist,” Manimaran told the Straits Times .

Khaw also added in a reply on his Facebook page that the exercise was a “meaningful collaboration which bonded the residents and foreign workers”.

“Racism, unintentional or not, is still racism. South Asian foreign workers are already stereotyped as being prone to violence and crime,” migrant rights activist Jolovan Wham told dpa .

“Targeting them in this exercise reinforces that perception and fails to address the larger issues which cause them to be marginalised in the first place.”

- dpa