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The three children, aged one to 12, were converted by their 40-year-old father Mohd Ridzuan Abdullah on April 12 using only their birth certificates.

Mother, M Indira Ghandi, 35, is appealing for her children to be allowed to practice their original faith.
Currently, the couple's youngest daughter Prasana Diksa is with Mohd Ridzuan whereas the other two - Tevi Darsiny, 12 and Karan Dinesh, 11 - are with Indira.
The kindergarten teacher is seeking refuge with a relative, fearing that Islamic officials would take her kids away.

"I am not anti-Islam and I am not saying that they (Muslims) are doing wrong things but why do non-Muslims have to suffer like this?" she asked as tears welled up in her eyes.

Indira's marriage is now is a limbo after her husband, K Patmanathan, 40, converted without her knowledge on March 11.

She claimed that her husband, who has since assumed the name Mohd Ridzuan Abdullah, had also converted their three children - aged one to 12 - on April 12 without their presence and using only their birth certificates.

"He took my baby (their youngest child) from me and ran away... I have not seen her ever since and I don't know how she's doing," lamented Indira.

As for her marriage, the teacher, who also claimed to have been physically abused, said the couple were married for 16 years and had been facing problems for a long time.

"It started so many years back that I can no longer keep track of when it started.

"Recently he asked for a divorce and I thought to myself that since that was what he wanted, I consented but he did not want to start the process and demanded that I do so.

"So I went to a marriage tribunal and filed for counselling in Ipoh but he never attended any of the counselling sessions," she said.

Indira claimed that after one particular explosive argument, which also involved her mother and sisters, her husband fled with their youngest daughter, Prasana Diksa.

"When we went to the police station and lodged a report, no immediate action was taken although my baby was still very young and needed to be breast-fed," she said.

Since that incident, Indira has filed six police reports, with one alleging that she feared for her life because her husband had threatened her.

Indira said the police managed to locate her husband later but only to discover that he had converted the children.

'I don't know what to do'

The couple's two other children - Tevi Darsiny, 12 and Karan Dinesh, 11 - are currently living with Indira, but both have sought refuge with a relative fearing that Islamic officials would take them away.

"I was neither told nor asked about it (the conversion)... I don't know what to do," she lamented.

According to Indira, her husband had called her last Wednesday and promised to return her youngest child.

"He asked me to come to the Islamic Department (Jais) in Ipoh and collect my baby because he could not care for her. But he didn't show up.

"Instead, there was a man waiting there to serve me papers from the Syariah Court granting custody of my other children to him," she said.

However, she refused to accept the papers as she believed that syariah laws had no jurisdiction over her