Kuala Lumpur: Malaysia's police chief has urged the Indian community to look within for the rising crime graph, saying the police force should not be blamed for this situation.
"The community's political leaders should find a solution to the problem," said Musa Hasan, Inspector General of Police.
Hasan, who had met editors of Tamil newspapers and journals, mooted that politicians and other leaders of the Indian community, which numbers over two million, conduct a study on the rising crime rate.
Shortcomings within the community could be behind the rising crime rate, <i>The Star</i> quoted him as saying.
Hasan said that there was a possibility that people displaced from plantations to urban areas, and deprived of job opportunities and amenities like housing, could turn to crime.
A bulk of the Indian diaspora here are Tamils who came during the British era to work in the rubber plantations.
They complain of discrimination in jobs and education.
Hasan also rubbished claims that 10,000 Indians had died in police custody, saying that only 1,000 people of all races had died while in custody.
The Malaysian population of 28 million has majority Muslim Malays, about 33 percent ethnic Chinese and eight percent Indians.