Indira's Legal Battle in Malaysia: A Comparative Study on Malaysian Newspapers Reporting

Abstract

In 2009, a Hindu mother of three children named Indira Gandhi turned to courts when she divorced her husband, Mohd Riduan Abdullah who forcibly took their youngest child, Prasana Diksa away from her. Riduan, who was formerly known as K. Pathmanathan, had converted to Islam and converted all three of their children without the consent of his wife. He had then obtained custody right for the children from the Sharia court. Indira Gandhi petitioned the civil courts to quash the unilateral conversions of her children's religion and to obtain custody for them. In January 2018, the Malaysian Federal Court issued a unanimous decision in favor of Indira Gandhi, voiding the children's certificates of conversion. Hence, it is deemed very important to study the news that has been reported by the media to the populace, especially in the Malaysian context that is widely known to consist of multiple ethnics and religions. This study will look at how this issue was being reported by three different newspapers in terms of ownership and ideology. This study also applied the textual analysis in analysing the discourses by the newspapers. Based on the findings, it is possible to conclude that there are significant differences in the reporting of this issue in the newspapers.

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