Religion : No solution in sight

A bold attempt to resolve a protracted problem has yet again revealed the rifts among Malaysians in matters of religion.

THE ongoing debate over the right of a convert to Islam to unilaterally convert his underage children underscores the importance of determining the public role of religion in a plural society like Malaysia.

The Cabinet recently made a courageous policy decision that when one party to a marriage converts to Islam, the minor children should be raised in the religion agreed upon by the parents at the time of marriage. This decisiveness will help to resolve an area of conflict over competing claims and interests that neither the individuals nor the courts have been able to resolve satisfactorily.

PSD Scholarships : Outline criteria for selection

IT’S the time of the year again for the recurrent stories of heartbreak and despair.

News of rejections of top Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) scorers for Public Service Department (PSD) scholarships for foreign degree programmes have hogged the headlines over the past week.

Scores of bright, evidently deserving students who had achieved remarkable results – between 14 1As and 10 1As – have been reportedly by-passed over others with seemingly lower scores. And as in past years, questions are being raised over the pro­cess of selection, with allegations of discrimination and unfairness being bandied about.

In the end, don’t forget our national language

OF LATE, people are very concerned about the use of English language in Malaysia. In the process, many of us have neglected our very own national language.

If you watch television, either the national channel or the private ones, you would notice politicians, Dee Jays as well as senior government officials making common grammatical mistakes in Bahasa Malaysia.

Perhaps, some of us are confused between the grammar used in Bahasa Malaysia and the ones in the English language.

For instance, in the latter, after the determiner “many”, plural forms of nouns are to be used. But, in Bahasa Malaysia, when a “determiner” such as banyak/ramai is used, the noun should be in singular form. We say banyak kereta instead of banyak kereta-kereta.

“Cintailah Bahasa Kebangsaan kita” (love our national language).