{"id":2106,"date":"2008-06-25T23:33:16","date_gmt":"2008-06-25T15:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/others\/2008\/06\/25\/convert-problem\/"},"modified":"2008-06-27T09:47:55","modified_gmt":"2008-06-27T01:47:55","slug":"elangesvaran-convert-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/borninmalaysia\/2008\/06\/25\/elangesvaran-convert-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"Elangesvaran convert problem"},"content":{"rendered":"

Update on 27 June: The deceased is married (NST<\/a>):<\/p>\n

\n

Elangesvaran is survived by his wife, V. Thanaletchumy, a 6-year-old son and a 11\/2-year-old daughter.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The court also ordered the body to kept in the hospital until both parties present their case.<\/p>\n

***********************************<\/p>\n

Sorry guys, the original posting was meant to be a draft and I didn’t realise it was actually published. It just contained the news articles from Star<\/a> and Malaysiakini<\/a>. I have edited it now:<\/p>\n

The issue here is the alleged conversion of B. Elangesvaran, (Malaysiakini<\/a> said Elangesvaran Benedict) aged 34 and a Hindu while alive. The deceased was a used-car dealer says<\/a> NST. He committed suicide 4 days ago (which in Islam is a major sin). According to the brother, Elangesvaran hanged himself.<\/p>\n

The brother, S Selvam (brother is B., but he is S.?) aged 48, filed a summons to stop the state Islamic Religious Affairs Department, the Perak Islamic Religious Department and the Parit Buntar Hospital director and their workers and agents from claiming the deceased body or preventing him from conducting a Hindu prayer rites.<\/p>\n

Hospital staff then informed him that deceased has converted at Penang Religious Affairs Department (how did the hospital know?) and the body cannot be released. So Selvam contacted Perak Religious Affairs Department (why not Penang?) for proof and confirmation, but only a police report and a letter was given. Selvem said<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“I was only served with a police report alleging that my brother had embraced Islam at the Penang Islamic Religious Deparment in Lebuh Pantai and a letter, with some scribbling allegedly done by Elangesvaran, that he had converted.<\/p>\n

“The letter, however, did not contain my brother’s signature or thumbprint or the signatures of any witnesses to indicate that he had embraced Islam as required under the tenets of Islam,”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Thus he claims that there’s no way the authorities can withhold the body or prevent him from proceeding with the funeral.<\/p>\n

Selvem says<\/a> the family had no knowledge of Elangesvaran’s intention to convert. He says Elangesvaran was a practising Hindu till his death.<\/p>\n

Now, what is the solution to this problem? There are two state agencies involved, thus making things complicated. The issue is on whom is the burden of proof is. Obviously the family does not need to prove anything since the deceased was by default an Hindu. So, the Penang Religious Affairs Department must provide proof (irrefutable one) that the deceased did indeed converted willfully. Police reports are not proof and so are scriblings in letters, since there would be proper records in the departments, for example on providing financial support to recent converts (saudara baru).<\/p>\n

If the person converted while not in right frame of mind, would it count? He could have converted for many reasons – money, love, privileges, or the religion itself. If he did convert, he did not inform the parents, so what to do?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Update on 27 June: The deceased is married (NST): Elangesvaran is survived by his wife, V. Thanaletchumy, a 6-year-old son and a 11\/2-year-old daughter. The court also ordered the body to kept in the hospital until both parties present their case. *********************************** Sorry guys, the original posting was meant to be a draft and I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,11,10],"tags":[92],"class_list":["post-2106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-borninmalaysia","category-indian","category-religion","tag-conversion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2106\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}