ON Feb 18, Malaysian English language teachers and generations of students mourned the passing of Prof Dr Ganakumaran Subra-maniam (pic), a leading figure in Malaysia’s English language teaching landscape.
As past president of the Malaysian English Language Teaching Association (Melta), Prof Gana, as he was known, was dedicated to providing continuing professional development opportunities for English language teachers in Malaysia. For more than a decade, he chaired an annual international conference on English language education. He was determined that Melta conferences centre-staged teachers, and he organised them in different parts of the country, including Sabah and Sarawak, just to ensure that no teacher was deprived of the opportunity to be part of an international gathering of English language teaching professionals.