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Saravanan: Kedah MB is spinning tales over Thaipusam cancellation

Saravanan: Kedah MB is spinning tales over Thaipusam cancellation
Saravanan: Kedah MB is spinning tales over Thaipusam cancellation

UPDATED 3.15PM: A Tanjong Malim resident has lodged a police report against Kedah MB Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor.

MIC deputy president M Saravanan has fired another salvo at Kedah Menteri Besar Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor, calling him a tale spinner (penglipur lara) who likes to twist stories just to amaze the people.

The two men have been at loggerheads ever since Sanusi announced that Kedah would reverse a seven-year-old policy of recognising Thaipusam as a public holiday this year due to the movement control order to contain the spread of Covid-19.

This morning in a post on Facebook, aimed squarely at the MIC man, Sanusi said that Tapah MP Saravanan had to cancel an appearance at his constituency scheduled for Jan 27, 2021, because there were not enough participants interested.

"Furthermore, Uncle Sara suffered from prolonged diarrhoea for the past few days," said Sanusi.

Both Sanusi's Islamist party PAS and MIC are part of the federal government led by Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, but the dispute appears to be widening a rift between the two.

"I am sad to hear the story of Uncle Sara, who could not go to Tapah because of diarrhoea from a tale spinner from Kedah.

"Fortunately, Uncle Sara's diarrhoea can be cured, but the shallowness and arrogance are difficult to treat because it is the natural personality of this tale spinner," said Saravanan.

Saya sayu mendengar al kisah Pakcik Sara yang tak dapat pergi ke Tapah kerana cirit-birit dari seorang Panglipulara dari...

Posted by Datuk Seri M Saravanan on Friday, January 22, 2021

He left no doubt that he was referring to Sanusi when he said the tale spinner was from Jeneri, which is represented by Sanusi as state assemblyperson.

"The tale spinner from Jeneri only knows nonsense, and late last night he told stories to confuse the people again. This is the tale spinner who did not know the difference between 'trillion' and 'billion' before," said Saravanan, mocking an occasion last month when Sanusi misspoke on the value of rare earth deposits in Kedah.

"Two days ago, this superficial tale spinner told the story of the cancellation of the Thaipusam public holiday, and now the storyline has changed again, as he was saying the holiday was not cancelled, because the holiday was never given or considered.

"This tale spinner is so obsessed with his story that he even says that the Thaipusam 2020 holiday is not announced! Of course, the reason for that was that the festival fell on Saturday last year and Kedah was already on the weekend!" said Saravanan.

The recent furore erupted after Sanusi announced that the public holiday would be cancelled, although religious events for the occasion are still allowed with strict conditions.

The decision to nix the holiday has courted flak from MIC, Pakatan Harapan, and even former Umno president Najib Abdul Razak.

In response to criticism, Sanusi said the move is not meant to sideline Hindus, and MIC should lobby for the federal government to make it a national holiday.

Prior to this, Sanusi had been accused of being anti-Hindu by critics, after the PAS state government demolished two Hindu temples.

He also hit back at critics then, saying they should not be "drunk on the toddy of popularity".

However, he denied the remarks were racist but were instead metaphorical and proverbial.

Police report lodged

Meanwhile, Tanjong Malim resident M Mythreyar lodged a police report last night against Sanusi for cancelling the Thaipusam holiday in Kedah.

"Sanusi intends to belittle Thaipusam and wants to seize the rights of Malaysian Hindus. Sanusi has also insulted the contributions and sacrifices of Hindu Indian leaders for the betterment of Malaysians.

"I hope the authorities will take action to prevent Hindu Malaysians from being dissatisfied with the Kedah government. My report is to stop Sanusi from cancelling religious celebrations of other religions arbitrarily because I think he does not think about racial harmony in Malaysian society," read his report which Malaysiakini sighted.

When contacted, Mythreyar said he lodged the report as a concerned citizen and did not belong to any political party.