Questions for Freddie

Dear Editor, In a recent letter (KN Mar 25), my friend Freddie Kissoon asked whether the enigmatic scholar Dr. Ravi Dev writes for a competitor newspaper. The answer is obvious  – Dev’s name does not appear as a byline in any other paper. Freddie asked (KN Mar 23) Shri Devanand Bhagwan where he got his statistic that Indians constitute 43% of the population of Guyana and that Indian American dominate the scientific, technical and medical fields and businesses in the US. Time magazine as well as the Economist last year carried extensive coverage of the academic and business success of Indian and Asians Americans. India Abroad also has ongoing reports of the achievements of the Indian and Asian American population. The reports noted that Indians and Asians are the highest income earners in America. Here are some questions for Freddie? Where did you get your statistic that Indians own 99.99 per cent of the wealth of Guyana?   I notice that Freddie had downgraded the stat (Mar 27) to 80% of the wealth.  Where did you get that stat? Fred also claims that that 90% of the new hires of the PPP in top layered positions are Indians.  Where did he get that statistic? In academia, one has to substantiate one’s claim with verifiable proof obtained from reliable and authentic sources – not guess work. No literature on Guyana has reported the kinds of stats revealed by Freddie. Is this a fantasy claim and bogus research to mislead readers? Here are some additional questions for Freddie: Why did he lie that his wife was fired from her government position when in fact she accepted early retirement? Why did Freddie claim he was terminated from his post at UG when in fact he had attained mandatory retirement age? Why did he lie about incidents and was reprimanded by the publisher and editor of his newspaper?  Why does he misstate and misinterpret positions of acclaimed writers and theoreticians? Vishnu Bisram