Appeal to return the child to her mother

Siti Fatimah was borned in 1978 to an Indian Muslim couple. She was brought up by her grandmother who is a practicing Hindu. She sees herself as an Hindu and declared herself as one on 21 Mar 2001 through a statutary declaration. She changed her name to Revathi Masoosai.

She married to Sureah a/l Veerappan, a Malaysian Indian Hindu on 10 March 2004, against her family’s opposition. They could not register their marriage because of her religion.

She gave birth to a daughter on 19 December 2005 at the Melacca General Hospital. Two days later, just about she was packing to go home, three men and a woman introduced themselves as officials from Malacca Islamic Office came to asked her to hand over her daughter to them. She refused.

She was not able to register her daughter as a Hindu. Infact her has difficulty in getting a her birth certificate. It requires her to change her Muslim name to Hindu name in her identity card.

In January this year, Revathi was taken to Pusat Pemulihyan Akidah di Ulu Yam, Selangor, for 100 days. Her detention will be due by 18 April. But her detention can be extended. Suresh and family took care of their daughter during her absent.

On March 26, Suresh was told that his daughter, now 15 months old, was taken away by a group of people consists of a policeman, a lawyer and Revathi’s mother. He claimed he has no knowledge of the where about of his daughter in a police report he made on the same day.

DAP Member of Parliament for Bukit Mertajam has brought the issue to the parliament on 29 Mac. She appealed to the Prime Minister to instruct the authority concerned to return the child to the mother. She said religion is about humanity and separating mother and child, husband and wife is inhuman, which she feels, is also against the value of Islam and family value that the Women, Family and Social Ministry wanted to promote in the “Family first” campaign.