"Antara dua darjat"

The beautiful Faezah Elai did well to potray Toh Puan Rahah, the mother to the current Prime Minister, Dato Najib Tun Abdul Razak and as the pillar of strength in Tun Abdul Razak's life and family in the movie Tanda Putera.

After the family's outing to see Tanda Putera on Saturday, Faezah's Elai's beauty must have made Toh Puan Rahah the family conversation over the weekend.

It's a family tale recently revived that our late father's elder brother, Mohd Amin was besotted with Toh Puan Rahah that he wanted to seek her hand in marriage. At our visit of a sickly aunt, our uncle told us that late Amin knew her from Toh Puan Rahah's brother.

Off course, Toh Puan Rahah went on to marry Tun Razak and gave birth to the present Prime Minister of Malaysia. Our mother, said it was a case of "Antara Dua Darjat", a famous P Ramlee movie and end up tragically for Amin.

The last movie Mother went to see at a cinema was P Ramlee's 1956 film, "Anak Ku Sazali" before becoming an Ustaz and later Imam's wife.  

The story is sketchy and for all you know, it is a case of tepuk tangan sebelah or an unanswered love.

Our arwah uncle could be just "syok sendiri" to "anak perempuan Dato Haji Noh yang paling lawo" (Dato Haji Noh's most beautiful daughter), said a source related to the family of Allahyarham Tan Sri Noah Omar and Allahyarham Tan Sri Taib Andak.

Tan Sri Noah is our Prime Minister's late grandfather (mother side) and his is seldom known in Johor by the nicname Haji Noh Beirut or Dato Haji Noh Beirut. He went to study at the Syrian Protestant College (now called the American University) of Beirut in 1914-19 in the thick of the World War 1.   

One Internet source here claimed that Taib Andak, the man responsible to start Felda by Tun Razak, was the person to introduce Tun Razak to Toh Puan Rahah.   


Before we get easily diverted by side story, we return back to the story of Amin.

He was a very studious kampong boy and eldest child to our grandfather school headmaster. As our late grandmother would describe, Amin would study with a small kerosene lamp till late into the night. In those days of early to bed and early to rise, staying up late till midnight is not common. 

Amin managed to enter into the prestigous Maktab Perguruan Sultan Idris (MPSI) in Tanjung Malim. Today, the college is known as Universiti Perguruan Sultan Idris (UPSI).

It was said that Amin was in the same batch with the late Tun Ghaffar Baba.  According to this blog source here, Ghaffar Baba studied at MPSI in 1946-49.

According to our uncle in Klang, together studying in the same batch at MPSI is one Abu Rais bin Mohamed Noah bin Mohamed Noah. 

In the book "Tan Sri Mohamed Noah: A Tribute", Abu Rais is the only son and third child to Dato Haji Noh Beirut. Toh Puan Rahah was the fifth and youngest child. Dato Hishamuddin's mother Toh Puan Suhaila is elder sister to Toh Puan Rahah.

Presumably Amin befriended Abu Rais and on holidays may have been invited to Dato Haji Noh Beirut's home.

According to two sources on Dato Noh Beirut (both presented to us by Hishmuddin) written as commissioned by Noah Foundation and another written by Zabha, he had returned to Muar in 1941 after serving as the Deputy District Officer for Mersing and First Class Magistrate. 

It was during the early part of Japanese Occupation and upon his return to Muar, the Japanese appointed him as Magistret. Few months later he was transferred to Batu Pahat and stayed there till the end of the war.

MPSI was the hotbed of Malay Nationalism and Amin involved himself in political activism. It is not confirmed but some uncle said he was involved in the formation of UMO. To what extent, the details is not known.

UMO was launched in a rally at the field in front of the Kelab Melayu Batu Pahat at the end of 1945.

While Amin was active in UMO, there are other family members in our kampong Mukim Bagan Batu Pahat that were involved in various political organisations like API, KMM, PKMM and Parti Negara.

UMO was initiated by Dato Onn Jaafar, the District Officer of Batu Pahat at the time. 

Right after the racial clash settled, Harold MacMicheal was sent to Kuala Lumpur to start to the formation of Malayan Union on October 11 1945.

The racial clash arised the atrocities of Bintang Tiga (MPAJA) communist on the Malays particularly and an uprising by the Malays led by the famous panglima Kiyai Salleh would have ended in a massacre of all Communist hiding in Bandar Penggaram town.  

Malayan Union plan was to strip the sovereign power and forcing the Malay rulers to accept Malaya to be placed under crown colony. The rulers were threatened with treason charges for cooperating with Japanese during their occupancy.

If Malaya had been the existence of sovereign Malay states, Malayan Union would dissolve all this states and legally turn us into a single British colony. 

At an evening in November 1945, several men led by Onn Jaafar, Syed Abdul Rahman bin Ahmad, Syed Alwi Alhady and Haji Anwar bin Haji Abdul Malik congregated at Dato Haji Noh Beirut's house at Jalan Sultanah, Batu Pahat to discuss and strategise ways to oppose Malayan Union.

Haji Anwar is the father to former Securities Commission Chairman, Tan Sri Zarinah Anwar and Sister in Islam activist and writer, Zainah Anwar. He is also the nephew of Dato Haji Noh Beirut.

UMO was the vehicle for the plan.  

At the first National Malay Congress at the Kelab Sultan Sulaiman in Kuala Lumpur on May 1-4 1946, at the suggestion of Pendita Zaaba, it was proposed that the word "kebangsaan" (national) inserted and UMO was changed to UMNO.

Batu Pahat naturally became the first UMNO Division in Malaysia. Other than being the district in Johor where UMNO was started, it is at the Dataran Batu Pahat that the first demand was made on the British in 1952 to stop pussy footing and determine the timeline for Merdeka.

It was Pak Lah's grandfather Sheikh Abdullah Fahim that later determined August 31st 1957 as the right and auspices date for Merdeka.  

And the rest is history.


Returning back to the story of Amin, he may have visited Abu Rais and his involvement with UMO that found his way to Dato Noh Beirut's home at Jalan Sultanah Batu Pahat.

And he may have continued to visit Dato Noh Beirut when he moved back to Johor Baru in September 1949 to assume the position of Yang Dipertua Jabatan Agama Johor. Between July 1947 to September 1949, Dato Noh Beirut was the District Officer of Segamat.

This was the position he was supposed to deputise in 1942 but refused when he got into a disagreement with then Menteri Besar Ungku Aziz and decided to return to Muar. 

While Amin was at MPSI, our father was a teacher at Maahad Arab Schol in Johor Baru. The school was on top of a hill at Wadi Hana and Dato Haji Noh Beirut's home was nearby.

Perhaps father and his brother Amin may have regularly visited Dato Haji Noh Beirut's home. Amin may have became a familiar face at Dato Haji Noh Beirut's home that he fell in love with young Toh Puan Rahah.

He request his father to "pergi masuk meminang" (seek engagement). As told by our uncles, grandfather's responded, "Kau gila ke nakkan anak Dato Haji Nor" (You must be mad for wanting to marry the daughter of Dato Haji Noh).

In the munakahat (matrimonial) practise in Islam, there is a criteria called kufu. It is acceptable to reject a proposal for marriage for differences in kufi between man and woman. For instance, the men's proposal can be rejected if he is of lesser occupation, status, wealth, etc than the woman. It is more out of practicality than a rule.

In Batu Pahat, Dato Haji Noh is known as a Magistrate, founder of UMNO, and later yang Dipertuan Jabatan Ugama. He comes from an aristocratic family and the son and grandson of the respected and influential Orang Kaya Muar and Orang Kaya Joned.

His lineage goes back to the Raja Chempaka Bugis and his family carries the title Orang Kaya for administering the district of Padang in Muar. They were an influential family in the era of Maharaja Abu Bakar of Johor (1862-1895).

Young Amin's love for young Toh Puan Rahah could not be consummated. In those days in Johor,  royalties and aristiocrats would tend to marry among each other. If one bother to check, all the famous leaders of Johor are linked to each other by marriage.

In the movie Tanda Putera, Tun Dr Ismail was Tun Razak's preferred Deputy and second man.

Tun Dr Ismail also comes from the same Raja Chempa Bugis Bukit Mor, Muar. Dato Haji Nog Beirut came from the Daeng Seriwa Raja (Bendahara Melaka) lineage, while Tun Dr Ismail came from the brother's, Daeng Indra Perma lineage.

Dato Onn Jaafar and Dato Haji Noh Beirut together formed UMNO and were grandfathers to Dato Hishamuddin.

Dato Onn has family linked to the royal family of Johor. It was during his tenure as Menteri Besar that he advised the family of Tun Dr Ismail bin Abdul Rahman was expelled to Singapore. When Dato Onn quit UMNO, the Rahman brothers was brought in by Tun Abdul Rahman to neutralise him.

Heartbroken young Amin left his family in kampong and moved to teach in Sri Gading, Batu Pahat. He later fell ill and died after few years of depression. Father attended to his brother.

So happen, our family is related to current Member of Parliament for Sri Gading and Deputy Minister, Dato Aziz Kaprawi.  

Most of us never believed this story but few years ago, an auntie revealed that it was serious. Toh Puan Rahah had personally come to visit our grandfather's family in kampong disguised as a friend of our auntie but only few knew that she was the endut(sweatheart) of their eldest brother.  

If one had watched P Ramlee's "Antara Dua Darjat", it is hard to believe that a daughter of aristocratic family would be allowed to travel and move around freely.

But then, Dato Haji Noh Beirut was a leader close to the people. Although he comes from an aristocratic family, he was raised with traditional values.

His mother was from a well known family of Kg Sakai. Upon the death of his father, Orang Kaya Omar,  she married a religious school teacher and young Dato Haji Noh Beirut received good religious upbringing.

Although his career in politics after retirement from Johor Civil service made him member of Parliment, Home Minister, and Speaker of the Dewan Rakyat, he had to work from the bottom as clerk and worked his way up through hardwork and continuous learning.

Maybe there was no "Antara Dua Darjat" and there was no such affair. It was already fated that Toh Puan Rahah married a great man and someone we, nephew of Amin, idolise so much for his sacrifice and contribution towards nation building.

Some of the cousins were saying, "If Wak Amin were to marry Toh Puan Rahah, he could be PM and our cousin be the present PM. Instead of Hishamuddin, it could be one of us cousin that is Minister."

In my mind, "Isy ... Jawa tak sedar diri."

-Another Brick in the Wall