“They are not seen as a custom issue; they are seen as a religious issue. Indira’s case is not going to be the last. There are going to be more.”

- Former law minister Zaid Ibrahim

COMMENT | Let me be very clear. M Indira Gandhi’s case, like many others, is a form of religious kidnapping.

In 2014, when the case of S Deepa first saw light, former law minister and US ambassador Nazri Aziz said this of the police’s ”mistaken assumption” for not retrieving the kidnapped child:

“It is a civil law marriage; it is the civil court, (and) we must respect the civil court’s ruling. They have the jurisdiction. The High Court judge’s ruling was correct. The police shouldn’t allow him to get away with kidnapping the child.”

Proponents of unilateral conversion have relied on the theme of religious and racial supremacy in support of this agenda and have twisted the Constitution of this country and played up racial and religious sentiments to bolster their arguments.

They have relied on the state security apparatus (which is supposed to be secular) to...