Maniam Moorthy - Death and Court Case

Death and Court Case

Moorthy died at 11.10 am on 20 December 2005 in the Intensive Care Unit of the Kuala Lumpur Hospital, which he had entered after doctors noticed he was having difficulty breathing. He was only 36 at the time of his death. His widow filed for a court order to claim his body on 21 December, but when she went to claim it, the hospital refused to release it in accordance with a 22 December Syariah Court ruling that Moorthy had converted to Islam before his death, given in response to an ex parte application by the Federal Territory Islamic Religious Council. The Syariah Court heard testimony from Moorthy's army colleagues, but his wife ignored a subpoena and did not appear in court to offer any testimony.

A fight broke out at the hospital when about 50 people began to shout abusive language at Moorthy's family; the situation was brought under control by military police.

In response to the Syariah Court ruling, Moorthy's wife through M. Manoharan filed her own application with the High Court seeking an order that the hospital hand over her husband's body. As a result, the hospital decided to retain the body rather than release it to the Islamic Affairs Department, on the advice of their legal adviser in the Ministry of Health. More than one hundred people came to the court gallery on the morning of 28 December to hear the judge's verdict. The High Court dismissed the application, stating it had no jurisdiction to determine whether Moorthy had converted to Islam, because the Syariah High Court had already ruled on the matter. Upon receipt of the ruling, the hospital released his body to the Federal Territory Islamic Affairs Department, which buried him in the Taman Ibukota Muslim Cemetery in Gombak, Selangor that afternoon. Security was heavy at his funeral, and his family did not attend, with the exception of his elder brother Mohammad Hussein.

Moorthy was posthumously promoted to the rank of sergeant in recognition of his service to the nation, with the promotion backdated to June 2005. His wife received a death benefit of RM110,000, and continues to receive his sergeant's pension of RM947.33 per month. Though under Islamic inheritance law, his elder brother, as the immediate family's only practicing Muslim, had the right to claim this benefit, he agreed to sign a written undertaking giving up all his stake in it, so that Moorthy's widow and child could receive the full amount. The Armed Forces urged the private sector to provide his wife with a job; in 2007, she was 32 years old and reported by American magazine Time to be working as an office cleaner.