After 12 years, Indira’s lawyer looking to implore courts to receive better cooperation from police to locate Prasana

KUALA LUMPUR, March 20 — Lawyers of M.Indira Gandhi have sought yet another date in court over the case of her missing daughter, Prasana Diksa, this time asking the courts to again pressure the Royal Malaysian Police (PDRM) to play their part in the probe to locate and recover the now 11-year-old child.  

Rajesh Nagarajan, Indira’s lawyer, told Malay Mail that among PDRM’s shortcomings was how they failed to submit more than 80 monthly affidavits required of them as part of a 2014 court order. 

Since the judgement, Rajesh said only one affidavit has been handed over to the legal team by police in January this year, a report which the lawyer said offered no new leads into investigations. 

“Absolutely none. The January affidavit was very scarce on details,” he said when asked to summarise contents of the most recent report. 

The Ipoh High Court had seven-years ago instructed police to supply periodic reports within the first week of every month updating Indira of investigations in the form of affidavits. 

The number of affidavits owed by the police was tabulated during a hearing at the Ipoh High Court in December last year, where Judicial Commissioner Bhupindar Singh instructed police to explain the 79 missing affidavits required of them from May 2014. 

As such, Rajesh said a Notice to Produce has been filed to the Ipoh High Court, following up on police’s January 5 affidavit, which is set to be heard this Monday. 

“In essence, the Notice to Produce is a demand for all the documents that have been mentioned in the PDRM Affidavit dated January 5, 2021,” he said when contacted. 

“We are seeking the intervention and the direction of the Ipoh High Court. The PDRM has not given effect to the direction of the Ipoh High Court that the PDRM give monthly updates in the form of an affidavit. 

“We are seeking updates on the search for Indira Gandhi’s daughter, Prasana,” he said.

Rajesh also lamented the apparent half-hearted attitude displayed by police in their conduct over the case. 

“It is our opinion that police have never provided meaningful updates. Until today, the police have never been able to provide the location of Prasana and neither have they made any headway in arresting Indira’s ex-husband,” he exclaimed.

The January affidavit from police, sighted by Malay Mail, essentially detailed the chronology of the 12-year legal battle since Indira’s first report in 2009, supplied as instructed by Judicial Commissioner Bhupindar back in December last year. 

Indira’s ex-husband, Muhammad Riduan, formerly known as K. Pathmanathan, embraced Islam in 2009 and converted all three of his children he had with Indira on April 2 that year without their mother’s knowledge. They had been raised as Hindus.

After a protracted court battle that spanned years, the Federal Court ruled in January 2018 that the unilateral conversions of Indira’s children were unlawful.

Their two older children, Tevi Darsiny, now 22, and Karan Dinish, now 21, have stayed with Indira, while Prasana has not been located since she was last seen at just 11 months old.

Among the excerpts included in police’s January report was how the force, based on advice given by a Senior Federal Counsel representing the Attorney-General’s Chambers, is of the view that the 2018 Federal Court judgement had sufficiently quashed the requirement of them needing to supply monthly affidavit reports. 

The reason given was because the case had been placed under the purview of the Ipoh High Court, negating the need for periodic affidavits. 

Other details include how police had conducted at least 10 raids in separate addresses throughout Perak since 2018 in search of Prasana and Muhammad Riduan, and at least two operations in search of his new spouse identified as Nor Shelly Ashikin Kamarulzaman. 

The report detailed how data from the Immigration Department revealed that Muhammad Riduan was last seen exiting the country, still under his old name Pathmanathan, in March 2014, while Nor Shelly last passed through the borders in November 2017. 

Additionally, Muhammad Riduan has also been added to the International Criminal Police Organisation’s (Interpol) Blue Notice which is for individuals suspected but not yet charged for a crime, with Prasana added onto Interpol’s Yellow Notice used to alert the masses on victims of parental and criminal abductions, kidnappings, or those of other unexplained disappearances.