Karpal Singh is very sneaky. You must watch your back side.

As a practising Taoist, I practised moderation but often end up getting emotionally disturbed because I am not tolerating such situations like those expresses in the above replies.

Religion has failed me so are all the other religions, I presumed.

Good day.

“Raimah Bibi made the ultmate sacrifice ….” 9to5

Ordinarily, husband and wife have joint custody of their children. To say that the wife by ‘giving up’ her children to her partner-husband has made the ‘supreme’ or ‘ultimate’ sacrifice is laughable. It sounds like a bad joke!

She has given up nothing – except her integrity when she agrees to making the affidavit that she is a Muslim. By agreeing to the affidavit, the state legal adviser and JAIS and whoever else involved including of course counsel are committing contempt of court.

On converting out of Islam through statutory declarations in the past, ah, those were the good old days. Times have changed and one would get into much difficulties these days with all these religious fanatics out to prevent apostates. Don’t think you have escaped because they might still get you when you die in a hospital and give you a muslim farewell.

The National Registration Department is also not so co-operative these days and they won’t support you if you want out of Islam. They will instead alert the the Syariah Court for you to be taken away for rehabilitation and re-education.

Yes, times have changed. Where are the good ole days?

He now wants anyone who doubts this especially Ivy Josiah to apologise to him, Raimah, the judge, the state legal adviser JAIS, and I suppose anybody who is hurt by it.

http://www.sun2surf.com/article.cfm?id=17821

So everyone out there, don’t doubt “Solomon’s Justice” as “compromised” by the good lawyer on behalf of his client, has taken place. Its no longer on your conscience. Now get back to work and move on.

The last I understand this was an out of court settlement. So appealing to the Agong is may not be an option.

We have the mother (Raimah Bibi) and the pretender (JAIS) but we do not have the wise King Soloman here as the case was settled out of court. The judge merely affirmed the private settlements.

Sorry to say, Malaysia at this point of time has no King Soloman. Badawi with his humble religious background has all the potentials to be the wise King Soloman but he did not make use his god-given opportunity to go down in history as a wise Prime Minister for all races. Instead, he kept silent and squandered away his god given opportunity to rule Malaysia fairly and wisely. Far from being King Soloman, now history may judge him as the person who allowed this chaotic religious oppression to thrive during his reign due to his own lack of courage.

We have the holymen, JAIS, who think that they are acting for God and the learned high priests, ulamak, who poured through thick volumes of holy books and debating among themselves which should be the more correct interpretation of God’s message. While this is going on, everybody forgot about common sense and the sufferings of the once happily married couple.

….At the hearing on Tuesday, Raimah Bibi, 39, broke down and sobbed openly when the judge asked her if she would give up custody of her seven children, who are aged between four and 14. “Yes, I agree to surrender my children.”…..

Raimah Bibi made the ultmate sacrifice to give up her 7 children due to her maternal instinct to protect her offsprings. Which mother will not grieve if her children and husband are taken away from her?

It takes a lowly rubber tapper to show to the world that the only person pure of heart here is Raimah Bibi – not JAIS nor all the learned holymen who professes to know the holybook inside-out! Which religion would force the separation of a family? It’s just common sense and plain humanity.

King Soloman would have allowed Raimah Bibi to reunite with her family.

If you compromised, you have compromised and reached an agreement and settlement.

If you now want to fight the “other” battle, then you would be going back on your compromise or word and this “compromise” itself can be challenged and voided.

How I wish this whole unhappy episode could have been totally and amicably settled once and for all.

It is indeed sad that Raimah now has to live seperately from her family as a muslim and they as Hindus. She has now to live her life as a Muslim when in her heart she believes in Hinduism.

She was NOT born a muslim but was raised as one. Does being raised as one makes her a Muslim if she did not convert to Islam?

I know of many children who had stayed with foster parents during their school days. Buddhists stayed with Hindus and Hindus with Christians and so on. But does staying, living and being brought up by foster families of different faiths meant that they had converted to the religion of their foster parents?

Does living and being brought up by muslim parents automatically make Raimah a muslim? Did she convert to Islam? If not, why are the religious authorities JAIS, saying that she is a muslim? What evidence do they have that she is indeed, a muslim?

She professed the Hindu faith she said and her original IC said so. Who better to say what your religion is than the person itself? Did Raimah apply to change her faith from “Hindu” to “Islam” when she applied for her MyKad? If not, would the Registration Department who took it upon themselves to change her faith from “Hindu” to “Islam” be at fault for acting unilaterally?

If King Solomon’s justice is sought, perhaps Karpal should consider appealing to the King (Agong) as the Head of the Islamic Religion in this country for remedy.

I know to many of us (me included when I read the news today), it is not victory, but I fervently believe that it is the ABSOLUTE VICTORY for her knowing that her children are safe with their own family.

It seems that the authorities (whether they are representing God or Devil) are pushing the boundary with every case and see how far they can go.

I am sure there are many parents among these authorities, and surely they know (probably not feel) the pain Raimah endured being separated from her children.

I think these authorities believe that “The end justifies the means” regardless of how much injustice is being imposed, as long as in the end, they believed they did something for their religion, they consider themselves a “living martyr” and will die a martyr.

The question I would like to pose is, what we as Malaysians can do about cases like these.

Sam

When I was studying constitutional law, it was at a time when the waves of Islamic fundamentalism have yet to reach Malaysian shores. The position taken by the late Lord President reflected the popular view then. But today we are living in the post Article 121(1A) world – and I cannot say that Suffian’s position is in sync with the popular view as much as I am no longer able to say with the same confidence if the Constitution of 1957 is completely secular or whether the intention was to create a completely secular state.

That does not, however, mean that Malaysia is an Islamic state.

On the issue of whether someone is deemed legally a Muslim one needs to look no further than our federal constitution. Only Malays are deemed legally Muslims and only Malays do not have the freedom to choose their religion and the prohibition against proselytizing applies only to Muslims.

The others, especially since the introduction of Art. 121(1A), are a matter of which court has jurisdiction – civil or syariah. Muslims irrespective of their ethnicity fall under the jurisdiction of the syariah courts. In the case of converts, they fall under the jurisdiction of the syariah court upon conversion.

What is not clear is if the issue of whether someone is in fact and in law a Muslim falls within the jurisdiction of the syariah court.

Bibi is not a Malay but an Indian who is a Muslim; and as a Muslim (not as a Malay who is deemed Muslim by law) she comes under the jurisdiction of the syariah courts. To change her religion she needed to appear before the syariah court and request for its consent. She did not and therefore remains under the jurisdiction of the syariah court. Was JAIS acting within the law when they sent her to rehab? You bet!

JAIS, MAIS and other bodies like them only act to administer the law and does not make them. Their pronouncements, directives etc do not have the effect of law.

It is unfortunate that these bodies along with the courts have not been entirely consistent in their interpretation of the relevant laws. It is unfortunate that the fact that religion has been politicized does not bring us any closer to the solution.

That, I respectfully submit, is the law today in a nutshell.

I personally think what Karpal Singh has done is a big achievement and victory considering the circumstances. He has saved 7 children from the crutches of the heartless Islamic Affairs Department.

The situation was such that Kapal cannot save 7 children and the mother at the same time. Hence, what Karpal did was to save the 7 children first and leave the fight for another day.

The children are all so young and if you leave them the Islamic Affairs Dept even for a short while, they would be very easily brainwashed by them. Meanwhile, the mother also helped by making the ultimate sacrifice to pacify the Islamic Affairs Dept by declaring that she would profess Islam. Otherwise, do you think that the all powerful Islamic Affairs Dept would agree to release the 7 children?

It would then be easier to re-unite the mother with the family at another time. I think this is what Karpal Singh is thinking.

To those people who are quick to denounce what Karpal has done is a hollow victory, think again. By the way, I’m not a DAP member although I appreciate what DAP has done so far!

Personally, I think one small victory at a time is a better approach than a strong head-on approach which can only go against a solid wall!

It is plainly obvious there is no clear directions on how these matters are to be dealt with. They are decided as to the expediency of each case. In this particular instance, I suspect that the crucial Ijok byelection with its large Indian voters population helped to swing the decision in partial favour of the victims. I said partial because this compromise solution in no way has resolved the matter as the mother had to “give up” her children, if not in spirit, at least in fact.

I also marvel at the hypocrisy and the double standards of the solution. On the one hand, the mother, who was obviously forced to make a false confession that she was “born” a Muslim ( a fact contradicted by her husband who claims she was adopted by a Muslim family) and has to remain one while her children, who would also be born a Muslim if their mother is a Muslim, are allowed out of the faith.

Notice the series of articles in the STAR the last few days by IKIM and IIU professors seemingly disagreeing with the interpretations and actions of the Islamic authorities such as JAIS in such matters? Those articles and the compromise solution of the Marimuthu/Raimah case seems to point towards an orchestrated attempt to pacify non Muslim anger at these unjust actions and blatant abuse of power of the Islamic authorities towards non Muslim victims. And the reason for this is clearly the imminent GE where the Govt. wants to curry the votes of the non Muslims. With such naked and shallow intentions, the non Muslims should not be blinded by such blatant hypocrisy and instead should spread the word that the war on religious freedom is far from over.

Fair enough, but you must remember the law of the land that has not yet been contradicted as laid down by the then Lord President Tun Salleh Abas in case of Che Omar bin Che Soh vs Public Prosecutor (1988).

Delivering the judgment of a five-man Federal Court panel, the then Lord President Tun Salleh Abas held that the Constitution and the legal system were “secular” and held that the meaning of the expression “Islam” or “Islamic religion” in Article 3 “means only such acts as relate to rituals and ceremonies”.

Tun Salleh Abas further said ‘there can be no doubt that Islam is not just a mere collection of dogmas and rituals but it is a complete way of life covering all fields of human activities, may they be private or public, legal, political, economic, social, cultural, moral or judicial’ but rejected the contention that the terms “Islam” or “Islamic religion” in Article 3 is “an all-embracing concept, as is normally understood, which consists not only the ritualistic aspect but also a comprehensive system of life, including its jurisprudence and moral standard” as this was not the meaning intended by the framers of the Constitution” (Reid Commission).

On Raimah Bibi Noordin’s status, “She was raised by Muslim parents but may or may not have been a practicing Muslim. That does not change her status as a Muslim by law” – Undergrad2.

Arguably it does – based on the way one conducts one’s life and practised beliefs, at least that’s what MAIS after consultation with JAIS and other legal advisers, said, after dropping its claim to Anthony Rayappan’s body : MAIS Chairman Datuk Mohamed Adzib Mohd Isa told the Bernama news agency that ‘although information gathered earlier had indicated that Rayappan was a Muslim, more recent evidence for his Christian beliefs was overwhelming.’

In that case Anthony had already converted to Muslim in 1990 (by reason of earlier marriage to a Muslim women) but he never shown by his way of life that he was a practising Muslim. In fact he was a practising Christian just as Raimah Bibi Noordin was a practicing Hindu whose marriage to Marimuthu Periasamy was conducted in Hindu rites.

The only difference between Anthony Rayappan and Raimah Bibi Noordin is that in former’s case Anthony had procured change of his IC to “Christianity” – in Raimah Bibi Noordin, her old IC was all along “Hindu” until a change to Mykad when they changed it back to “Muslim” that she didn’t bother to rectify.

The original status appears not to matter – in the case where one is not born into the faith, as Malays – like for example Anthony Rayappan, a Muslim since 1990 conversion or Raimah Bibi Noordin by virtue of being raised in or adopted by a Muslim Convert family.

Neither is it based on what the IC says. In the case of Nyonya Tahir, who died on January 19, the Seremban Sharia Court acknowledged that she was a non-Muslim at the time of her death and allowed her family to bury her as one, even though her identity card explicitly stated she was a Muslim !

Bottomline is how one conducts one’s life and professes belief to family members and immediate society that should be the determining factor (according to what MAIS Chairman Datuk Mohamed Adzib Mohd Isa seemed to say).

Based on this criteria, there is a genuine point of contention in Raimah Bibi Noordin whether she has long practised as a Hindu and should be considered a Hindu. (Her adopted Muslim convert family gave blessing to her marrying Marimuthu via Hindu rites. She had since lived together with Marimuthu for 21 years and raised their children as Hindus).

How could JAIS be sole arbiter and judge that she according to Datuk Mohamed Adzib Mohd’s criteria has not become a Hindu ?

True religious allegiance flows from within the man, and not something coerced and imposed from without by some alien and contrary power; the former is genuine, the latter is ‘nerakaic’ and ‘syaitanic’ [hellish].