KOTA KINABALU: Police would prefer that the children of two couples involved in custody battles in the civil and syariah courts be placed in the care of the Welfare Department.
Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar said police would not be enforcing any order from the two courts in the case of kindergarten teacher M. Indira Gandhi in Ipoh and clerk S Deepa in Seremban.
He said police would place the affected children in a child care center without enforcing either of the syariah or civil court orders as this will be fair to both parents
"I will discuss with the Perak and Negri Sembilan police chiefs on this and see whether it is best that the children are kept in the Welfare Department," he told reporters here.
This way, both parents need not fight over the custody of their children and both can visit them at the Welfare Department if they want.
In April 2009, Muslim convert Mohd Ridzuan or formerly K.Patmanathan, took away their youngest child Prasana Diksa, then 11, and converted her and two siblings Tevi Darsiny, then 12, and Karan Dinish, then 11 to Islam without their mother's knowledge.
The High Court granted Indira Gandhi full custody of all three children and on March 11, 2010, Mohd Ridzuan was ordered to return Prasana Diksa to the mother.
At the same time, the Syariah High Court awarded Mohd Ridzuan custody of all three children.
In the case involving a 30-year-old clerk S. Deepa and her Muslim convert husband, then known as N. Viran, both are fighting for the custody of their children as the Syariah and Civil laws have granted both parents custody.
In December last year, Deepa filed an application to get custody of the chidren who were converted to Islam by the husband after he embraced Islam in 2011 and to quash the custody order by the Syariah court.
Deepa said her husband left her and her children three years ago, and had never supported them financially.
Following his conversion, he converted his children, Sharmila, 9, and Mithran, 6, in April last year, without informing her.
Deepa later came to know that the Syariah court had given him custody of the children.
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