Australia has always regarded itself as The Lucky Country. That and the promise of quality education at a reasonable cost with the good life thrown in saw Indian students come in droves in the past few years.
Last month though, Australia’s reputation in India as a fun-loving, beer-swilling, cricket-crazy nation took a severe knocking after a spate of suspected racist attacks and hate crimes were reported against Indian students. While reports had been coming in of a growing number of such attacks in the past few months, what caught the headlines was when 25-year-old Shravan Kumar Theerthala, a student from Andhra Pradesh, was stabbed with a screwdriver and three other Indian students were beaten at a party allegedly by a group of locals in Melbourne, the capital of Victoria.
Melbourne houses almost half of the Indian students in Australia and the incident sent shockwaves across the community. Soon after there were reports that Baljinder Singh, a hospitality graduate, was stabbed in the stomach by two attackers, who first robbed him of his cash and then knifed him.
And back in Melbourne, even as Australian authorities announced steps to clamp down on such crimes, Nardeep Singh, a 21-year-old nursing student, was confronted by five men at a campus in the city’s south-east. He refused to obey their instructions to hand over his money and cigarettes after which one of the men slashed his chest with a box-cutter resulting in minor lacerations.
As worried and fearful Indian students held a massive rally, calling for Australians to act against hate crimes, the new Manmohan Singh Government was quick to express its outrage over the incidents. External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna said he was “appalled” by such attacks and wanted the Australian Government to act swiftly. Manmohan called up his Australian counterpart Kevin Rudd to express his concern.
Diplomacy apart, there was also a swift reaction from India’s bestknown export—Bollywood. Even as Amitabh Bachchan’s fans shaped the superstar’s decision to decline an honorary doctorate from the Queensland University of Technology, the world’s biggest film industry also made its feelings known. There were media reports that Indian film crews too would not work on Australian soil until the attacks on Indian students came to an end.
Australian actress Tanya Zaetta, who had a role in Salaam Namaste, found herself playing mediator. “I understand completely Indians being upset over the recent racial attacks. I’m appalled by these myself,” Zaetta said.
“It makes me ashamed to be Australian when you hear about attacks on people of other cultures. But I think everyone needs to take a deep breath and calm down. Bollywood boycotting Australia will only drive the two countries further apart," she added.
Realising that the matter was getting out of hand and the damage to Australian’s reputation as a centre for international education would be severe, the Australian Government moved swiftly at the highest levels of politics and law enforcement. After Manmohan’s call, Rudd was quick to react.
“I speak on behalf of all Australians,’’ he said, “when I say that we deplore and condemn these attacks.” The language of diplomacy aside, the Australian Government, the Victoria Government and Victoria Police all emphasised that preventing attacks is a priority. While Rudd emphasised that Indian students are “welcome guests’’ in this country, he was not merely using conciliatory language, but was setting in motion a viable answer to India’s concerns.
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