Indian students, racism and a debate spiralling out of control

Says Paul Austin in The Age Opinion Column:
"John Brumby has lost control of the violence-against-Indians debate. That's scary for a premier who likes to be in control. Scarier still that it's happening in an election year.

Brumby wants to play down the idea that the recent spate of bashings and stabbings of Indians is evidence that racism is on the rise in Victoria.

He adopts this position for three main reasons. First, and fundamentally, he thinks the idea is wrong and repugnant.

But there are also financial and political considerations.

The multibillion-dollar international student industry is a big earner for Victoria - a state not blessed with mineral resources like Queensland and Western Australia - and, naturally, Brumby wants to protect it.

And the political interest of any premier is best served if their community has a self-image as a safe, welcoming, tolerant place.

The problem for Brumby is that a growing list of people are refusing to adopt his sotto voce approach. The danger for the Premier is that as more people speak out about the problem of racism in Victoria, and accuse the government of an inadequate response, he will be seen as unrealistic and isolated."

Meanwhile Police keep lid on stats for Indians :
"POLICE Chief Commissioner Simon Overland has admitted there are ''limitations'' in the statistics he and Premier John Brumby have been relying on to inform the public about Indians as victims of crime - and he won't release them.

He said information about a victim's race was based on a subjective assessment of their appearance - and Indians were included in the broad category of ''south Asian appearance''. Such a category could also include those from countries other than India such as Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.

Mr Overland is refusing to release the statistics on the grounds that they are ''subjective and open to interpretation''."
Update (Feb.13th)
The politics of violence by Sushi Das
Brumby, Baillieu clash over state's crime level
From Victoria in a state of denial
"Professor Marginson, who has studied similar targeting of foreign students in other countries, said Victoria had been far slower to recognise the race issue than was New Zealand when it faced attacks on Chinese students and the US with students of Middle Eastern origin.

Mr Overland said recently that the police had been aware of the unusually high level of attacks on Indians for the past two years. However, it was only when the issue received widespread coverage in the middle of last year that the Brumby government and the police launched a series of visible initiatives to try to stop the attacks. Since then, measures have been steadily introduced, ranging from sentencing laws for hate crimes, a 24-hour student care service and a targeting of hot spots. Yet Mr Brumby has not given Mr Overland what he needs most to combat the problem: a surge in police numbers to enable officers to be stationed permanently at night at train stations, on trains and in the streets of poorer suburbs where the attacks are taking place. Mr Brumby last year announced he would lift police numbers by 120 officers, barely enough to combat the general rise in violent crime across Melbourne, much less crimes specifically directed against Indian students.

"The chief commissioner is clearly not getting the resources to manage the situation," Mr Gupta said. "I think this will come back to haunt the government at the next election.""