Denison Jayasooria of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia said the council or committee, to be chaired by the prime minister, would look into addressing the unresolved concerns in the Indian community.

“This is most needful and urgent,” he said in a likely reference to the Cabinet committee for the Indian community set up by former prime minister Najib Razak in 2009.

In a statement, he said the establishment of such a committee was among the “major concerns” Mitra must address.

Denison also said Mitra should review the policies on the RM100 million grant disbursement to ensure clear guidelines and transparency with no political interference in decision-making.

“Mitra must establish strong monitoring and impact evaluation procedures so that there is public disclosure of this information to restore public confidence,” he said.

He added that the special committee must ensure Indian concerns are not just ethnic concerns but national concerns, especially those related to the B40 community, documentation and citizenship.

“Mitra must focus on the major issues of access and participation of the Indian community in programmes run by government agencies, in order to ‘plug into the government machinery’,” he said, adding that this was to secure adequate places in matriculation and public universities as well as training institutions.

Denison said there was also a need to strengthen Mitra’s staff and organisational resources, including appointing employees with the required qualifications and experience in project management and monitoring as well as policy research and advocacy work.

There is also a need for Mitra to have staff at the district level for more effective engagement with underserved Malaysian Indians, he said.

Yesterday, the Cabinet decided to place Mitra back under the Prime Minister’s Department, a move that was jointly agreed to by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and national unity minister Aaron Ago Dagang.

The unit was placed under the national unity ministry in December.

Denison said while the decision to return Mitra to the Prime Minister’s Department was welcomed by most Indian organisations, it should not be seen as automatically resolving many of its challenges in addressing the issues and concerns of the bottom 40% of the Indian community.