KUALA LUMPUR – Single mother Loh Siew Hong has filed an application for a judicial review at the high court here to quash the unilateral conversion of her three children to Islam.
Speaking to The Vibes, Loh’s lawyer Srimurugan Alagan said his client will seek a declaration that a Perlis enactment allowing unilateral conversion of minors is null and void.
It is understood the Perlis Registrar of Muallaf, the Perlis Council of Islam and Malay Customs, Perlis Mufti Datuk Mohd Asri Zainul Abidin, and the Perlis government are named as respondents.
Earlier this month, Loh’s lawyer Shamsher Singh Thind reportedly said that Loh had sent a legal notice to the muallaf registrars of Penang, Kedah, and Perlis on February 16.
“The task of these offices is to register individuals who have embraced Islam. These individuals will be given a certificate as proof.
“On February 23, the Penang Islamic Council responded to our letter confirming that the three children had not converted to Islam in the state.
“We are still waiting for feedback from Kedah and Perlis. If it’s true (that the children were converted to Islam), please show us the proof,” he was quoted as saying.
Previously, it was reported that Loh would challenge the unilateral conversion of her children – a 10-year-old boy and 14-year-old twin girls – through a judicial review.
On February 21, Loh was granted a writ of habeas corpus by the high court here against the unlawful detention of her three children.
Judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah, when delivering his judgment, agreed with Srimurugan that respondents in this matter had gone against court orders issued in 2019 and 2021 that grants the single mother full custody of the children.
Loh’s plight made headlines after she was refused permission to meet with her children, whom she had been trying to locate for the past three years since being discharged from the hospital.
She had lost contact with her children while undergoing treatment for injuries purportedly stemming from an abusive marriage with her ex-husband, Nagashwaran Muniandy.
It was during this void that Nagashwaran is said to have unilaterally converted his children into Islam, following his own conversion.
Following the change of faith, Nagashwaran was then convicted and imprisoned for narcotics-related charges and continued to be incarcerated until November.
Loh has since divorced Nagashwaran and only managed to meet her children thrice over two weeks, before being reunited with them on February 21. – The Vibes, March 25, 2022
