KUALA LUMPUR: Senior men in dhotis and young women in yellow lined Brickfields’ main thoroughfare, Jalan Tun Sambanthan, yesterday morning to collect signatures for the petition to save the 100-year-old Vivekananda Ashram. Among them was Lembah Pantai MP Nurul Izzah Anwar.

She said Brickfields should not be synonymous with KL Sentral, but it should be viewed as a melting pot of Malaysian cultures. “I am a Malay Muslim but this is part of my heritage that belongs to me as a Malaysian,” she told reporters after tying a yellow ribbon on the gate of the ashram and signing the petition. She said that given its history and background — as a venue for education and cultural activities, and for uplifting youth — the ashram should not be allowed to be developed into a commercial project.

Also present was MIC youth chief Sivarraajh Chandran, who said he hopes the ashram’s board of trustees will listen to the voices of the people and withdraw plans to redevelop the site.

Photojournalist SC Shekar  noted that the board of trustees has turned down offers of financial contributions and donations  for the past 15 years.

“And now they are saying that funding is the problem,” said Shekar.

The daughter of former MIC president, the late Tun VT Sambanthan, was also present yesterday. Kunjari Sambanthan told The Malaysian Insider that having been born and raised in Kuala Lumpur, she is fond of the ashram, more so as it is located on the road named after her father.

“Across the road there is the new Brickfields. Can’t we preserve this as the original Brickfields instead of measuring everything by real estate value?” she said.

Ashram member T Thanapalan, who was busy getting signatures for the petition, said he had attended the annual general meeting that decided on the plan for the sale in January this year, adding that it was approved. But, he said the board did not have the power to reject the request to gazette the site, as revealed by Tourism Minister Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz.

“They should have taken that proposal to the members, but they didn’t,” he said.

Some 43,000 peopale have signed the petition so far. The signature drive will continue until today, after which it will be compiled and handed over to Kuala Lumpur City Hall tomorrow. — The Malaysian Insider

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on November 10, 2014.