Woman's 10-year battle to quash childhood Islamic conversion ended

 

A woman's over 10-year legal battle to nullify her 1991 childhood Islamic conversion came to an end today when the apex civil court dismissed her appeal to reverse her religious status.

A three-person Federal Court bench in a split 2-1 verdict denied the 36-year-old's appeal to restore the 2021 Shah Alam High Court ruling that quashed her religious conversion brought about by her Muslim convert mother.

In January last year, the Court of Appeal allowed the appeal by the Selangor Islamic Religious Council (Mais) and the state government to reinstate the woman's Islamic conversion.

In 1991, her mother - then having separated from her Hindu father - converted to Islam and sought Mais' assistance to convert the woman, who was five years old then, to Islam as well.

Two years later, Jais issued a conversion certificate for her. However, her mother - having married a Muslim man by then - allowed her to continue practising Hinduism.

Between December 2013 and July 2017, the syariah courts denied her bids to nullify the conversion, prompting her to turn to the Shah Alam civil court.

Majority ruling

Court of Appeal president Amar Abang Iskandar Abang Hashim and fellow Federal Court bench member Abu Bakar Jais constitute the majority ruling, while bench member Mary Lim Thiam Suan dissented.

Reading out the majority ruling, Abu Bakar said the woman falls under the category of “no longer a Muslim” and not “never was a Muslim”.

He said only the Syariah Court has jurisdiction over people who claim to no longer be Muslims and the civil court only has jurisdiction over those who were never Muslims from the onset.

This is because the woman, despite being converted to Islam when young, was raised as a Muslim till her adulthood.

He noted that when the woman came to the Syariah Court in 2013, made her case on the premise that she wanted to renounce the faith and did not challenge the validity of the childhood conversion.

Abu Bakar further said she only raised the issue of the validity of her childhood conversion when she went to the civil court.

He noted that the Selangor state syariah enactment applies here because the woman was raised under her Muslim convert mother's care as a Muslim.

"As long as one professes the religion of Islam, one is identified as a Muslim despite the degree of faith or practise," Abu Bakar said.

Dissenting ruling

However, in her dissenting ruling, Lim ruled that the woman was never a Muslim from the very beginning as the appellant was converted when young, whereby non-adults are not able to consent to the conversion.

She noted that the prevailing Selangor state enactment back in 1991 required the consent of both father and mother to convert their children to Islam, pointing out that the Muslim mother converted the woman without the Hindu father's consent.

Lim said that a later amendment in 1992 of the state enactment - which allowed unilateral conversion of a child without needing the consent of both parents - does not apply here as the actual conversion happened in 1991.

"She was not a child born to Muslim parents. Her conversion was done unilaterally by her mother and without her father's consent.

"She did not understand what happened at the time," Lim said over the conversion that took place on May 17, 1991.

The apex court today made no order as to costs.

Counsel Malik Imtiaz Sarwar and Surendra Ananth represented the woman while lawyer Mohamed Haniff Khatri Abdulla appeared for Mais.

State legal adviser Salim Soib @ Hamid represented the Selangor government. - Mkini