The High Court has released a temporary injunction halting the implementation of a Family Court order asking a man to hand over his five month old baby to its Swiss mother.
The man has been identified by the police as Ahmed Sharuvan, age 32, from Kanmatheege in Maradhoo in Seenu atoll. The information had been released when police launched a nationwide search for the man after he failed to comply with a Family Court order last week.
The superior court released the injunction after Sharuvan submitted an appeal in the court against the Family Court’s verdict.
The High Court injunction – signed by three judges – stated that the court believes it important to halt the Family Court order until after Sharuvan’s appeal has been completed.
Although the case’s first hearing was scheduled by the High Court for Sunday, it was later cancelled.
Sharuvan’s wife – identified in local media with only a first name, Tanya – also attended Sunday’s court hearing.
Sharuvan attended Sunday’s hearing at the scheduled time and was accompanied by a lawyer. Police began questioning him outside the court premises, with Sharuvan responding by showing the police the High Court’s temporary injunction.
In spite of this, police took Sharuvan to the police headquarters for further “discussions”.
“We did not have the jurisdiction to arrest him then due to the High Court injunction although we were previously looking for him,” a police media official told Minivan News today.
“So we requested him to come along with us to headquarters for further discussions and he obliged. We did not have the jurisdiction to directly question him, so we just held a discussion. He left the police premises directly after the discussion.”
Owing to the High Court injunction, police revealed that the baby remains in the custody of the father. They stated that the police cannot take any action on the matter until Sharuvan’s appeal case at the High Court reaches completion.
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The first thing to consider is the welfare of the child. Whatever the differences between this guy and his wife, the infant has to take priority here.
It's obviously unjustifiable for the this man to take away the infant away from its mother and deprive both the child and mother.
From what I understand the man is making some absurd claims along the lines that he took the child away for "religion", i.e. because the mother refused to educate the child as a Muslim!
That flies in the face of his own actions. He met this woman when she was on holiday. He clearly didn't consider his religion too much when he approached her then and beget a child subsequently.
Secondly, we are talking about a 5 month infant! Religion or anything else doesn't even enter the equation here until this infant actually grows up to become a child. The emotional well being of the infant is totally disregarded by this man.
If he is so pious and religious, then why did he go after this woman in the first place?
the previous comment by hassan is very reasonable and I congratulate him for it.
For the records, the mother of the child, Tanja S., has made a petition with avaaz.org, which right now has more than 600 signatures. She writes;
"I am German but now in the Maldives and have submitted a case to the Family Court. The Family court on Monday issued an injection to my Husband Ahmed Sharaan to handover the baby to me within 24hours, by 3pm Tuesday 11th February 2014. However, he refused to obey this court order and went into hiding for several days. Whilst in hiding, he arranged a lawyer and submitted an appeal to the High Court to cancel the Family Court injunction. The High Court on Sunday 16th March, suspended the injunction of the Family Court without even hearing my side of the story and without a hearing. My husband is accusing me of trying to bring up the child as a non-Muslim despite the fact that I had formally converted to Islam in December 2013."
You can see it here: https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Supreme_Court_of_the_Maldives_Legally_assign_the_custody_of_my_5_month_old_daughter_to_me/?pv=1