He told the researchers at the government-linked think tank that it was no use merely releasing numbers and not identifying the actual cause of the decline.
He said releasing numbers showing a drop in socio-economic mobility among Malaysians of Indian descent had merely confirmed what the community had believed all along.
What was reported by KRI, therefore, was no major revelation, he added.
“While the findings of the study are interesting, the reasons for the differences between the ethnic groups are left untouched.
“KRI should drop its academic pretensions and find out the real cause of Indian marginalisation in the country,” Ramasamy said in a statement today.
Last week, KRI said it had found that less than 10 per cent of Indian children born to parents who either had never gone to school or had dropped out of primary school, went the full distance themselves in getting tertiary education.
The numbers were found to be the lowest among the three principal communities in the country – the Bumiputeras, Chinese and Indians.
This was reflected in KRI’s “Climbing the Ladder: Socio-economic Mobility in Malaysia” study.
Ramasamy, who is also Penang Deputy Chief Minister II, criticised KRI for lacking the “honesty and decency” to find out why Indians in the country continued to slide behind other races.
“Statistics by themselves are insufficient to ascertain the ills that have been plaguing the community in the last 60 years or so.”
Saying that the very government that was responsible for setting up KRI was the primary source of the Indian tragedy in the country, Ramasamy added:
“I fully understand that Khazanah does want to bite the hand that feeds it, but surely, it cannot have the cake and eat it too at the same time.”