A single mother’s determined effort bore fruit after three years of yearning and pining for her children. Loh Siew Hong finally met her children on 14 February for the first time after three years of cruel denial! At last, her long search for them ended.
But alas, she was given just one hour to meet up with her children at the police station. Why only one hour, you may ask. The rationale for this was not clarified or explained. It was the typical high-handed decision that made no sense.
Here was a mother who had not seen her children for three long years and yet there was no compassion or sympathy for the lonely mother. It was solely a religion-based decision to deny any opportunity for bonding with the Hindu mother and her three children, who had been surreptitiously converted to Islam without the mother’s knowledge or consent.
This took place when her abusive and violent husband abducted the children without her knowledge when she was hospitalised and recuperating, and he unilaterally converted them to Islam by lying that he did not know about the whereabouts of his wife.
The children were converted to Islam through an evil deed and a lie perpetrated by the Hindu husband.
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To compound complications, the religious authorities did not bother to conduct a search to find the mother. They just did not care. They were just happy to convert the children who were in their tender years.
The twin girls were about 11 and the boy was seven – not mature enough to choose a faith and too young to renounce the religion they were born into for no apparent reason. They were just caught in a situation where the father was able to exploit them and took undue advantage of their innocence.
The religious authorities involved in the so-called conversion cannot plead ignorance that the highest court in the land had in 2018 declared and ruled that for a legitimate conversion to take place, the consent of both the parents is obligatory.
That is the law now and no state can pass any law requiring only the consent of a single parent to carry out a unilateral conversion. State laws must conform with federal laws; they must be subordinate to federal laws at all times.
This being the case, the unilateral conversions of these three children three years ago cannot be legal; they are null and void. There is no legal effect to support these unilateral conversions. The children cannot be recognised as Muslims.
If these conversions are null and void, the children cannot be Muslims by any stretch of the imagination – which would mean they are still Hindus and remain in the religion they were born into.
All those now demanding that the children must remain as Muslims either do not know the law or wilfully choose to defy it. This is a dangerous stand to take. This will be akin to playing with fire and will have a tendency to arouse passions and anger, which will destroy our collective harmony and peaceful existence.
This cannot be allowed and must be nipped in the bud. The government and the police have a duty to land hard on these trouble-rousers.
The Constitution and the law must always rule. No one has a right to demand for something that is wrong and clearly not supported by the Constitution and the law.
AGENDA RAKYAT - Lima perkara utama
- Tegakkan maruah serta kualiti kehidupan rakyat
- Galakkan pembangunan saksama, lestari serta tangani krisis alam sekitar
- Raikan kerencaman dan keterangkuman
- Selamatkan demokrasi dan angkatkan keluhuran undang-undang
- Lawan rasuah dan kronisme
Yes, it could set a precedent where non-Muslim minors are lured by unscrupulous people and converted and then make demands that these minors be raised in the faith they have been unlawfully converted into.