A single Hindu mother Loh Siew Hong’s three unilaterally converted children will remain non-Muslims, a court ruled on Tuesday.
Chief Justice Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat-chaired three-person Federal Court bench unanimously denied the appeal leave application by the Perlis Islamic Religious and Malay Customs Council (Maips) and three others to reinstate the children’s 2020 unilateral conversion.
The other appellants were the Perlis state government, state mufti Mohd Asri Zainul Abidin, and the state mualaf (new Islamic converts) registrar.
The 36-year-old mother’s appeal to nullify the unilateral conversion of her twin daughters, 15, and son, 12, by their Muslim convert father Muhammad Nagahswaran Muniandy was allowed by the Court of Appeal on January 10.
On May 11, the Kuala Lumpur High Court dismissed her judicial review targeting the validity of the unilateral conversion following which she made the appeal.
Tengku Maimun read out the ruling on behalf of fellow bench member judges P Nallini and Abu Bakar Jais, saying the appellants were making an attempt to revisit the landmark Federal Court ruling in 2018 on Indira Gandhi’s unilaterally converted children.
The apex court ruled in 2018 that the conversion of a child to Islam requires the consent of both father and mother.
The top judge dismissed the leave application with no order as to costs.
Loh and Nagahswaran married in 2008 but got separated over allegations of domestic violence and she was even hospitalised. In December 2019, she filed for divorce. Later, it was reported that the father took away their three children and converted them on July 7, 2020, while she was recuperating from her injuries in a hospital.
Loh got the sole custody of her children in March 2021 and divorced her husband in September 2021.
