To make it a happier occasion, K Arvind will be celebrating Ziona Kashmirah’s ninth birthday today with his parents here.
Last December, a family court in Napier, a seaport town on the eastern coast of the North Island, ruled that he could have sole custody of Ziona. The father and daughter finally met at KLIA on April 4.
Arvind, a project manager in a food-related industry here, represented himself via a virtual hearing but with help from his Malaysian lawyer in Ipoh, Balakrishna Balaravi Pillai who helped prepare the submissions.
“I was not able to travel there due to the Covid-19 pandemic,” he told FMT.
Arvind, with the help of a friend in New Zealand, then sent a flight ticket and an emergency permit from the Immigration Department here to be submitted to the court there before Ziona was allowed to return.
“She was emotionless when airport staff handed her to me. But she recognised my voice when I uttered ‘Avi’,” he said, in reference to what the daughter used to call him when she was much younger.
Arvind married S Rajinah here in 2011 and their daughter was born a year later.
His predicament began in 2015 when Rajinah, a housewife, left for New Zealand for a three-month “holiday” but the stay was extended to a year.
A New Zealand online newspaper, Stuff, in December 2018 reported that the mother and wife claimed she was fleeing from an alleged “life of violence and abuse” at Arvind’s hands.
“She returned home for her sister’s wedding in 2016,” he said, adding that Rajinah left his home with Ziona claiming that their daughter was to be the flower girl at the wedding ceremony in Rawang.
After the function, Rajinah stayed back with her parents but later left for Penang before leaving the country with Ziona – without Arvind’s knowledge.
“The Malaysian Immigration System later revealed the mother and daughter left for Saudi Arabia en route to New Zealand,” Arvind said, adding that he later sought and obtained a sole custody order from the High Court in Kuala Lumpur in October 2016.
However, Rajinah also engaged a lawyer to get an interim ex parte custody order at the Shah Alam High Court in February 2017 to extend Ziona’s visa in New Zealand.
She then obtained a new custody order at the High Court in Ipoh in July 2018, which Arvind was not aware of.
Arvind only came to know of the Ipoh High Court custody order when Malaysian Immigration officials informed him that Rajinah had used this order to apply and extend the New Zealand visa and Malaysian passport for Ziona.
The Court of Appeal later set aside the Ipoh order as it was obtained after the order obtained by Arvind in Kuala Lumpur.
Arvind said he sent the Court of Appeal order to the New Zealand immigration authorities, asking that Ziona be returned to her father in Malaysia.
Meanwhile, Rajinah had applied to the family court in Napier to have custody of the girl.
Balakrishna said Rajinah has been charged in a New Zealand court for having committed immigration fraud and has since been sentenced to a custodial sentence.
FMT also understands that Rajinah is currently living with another man and their two children in New Zealand despite being still legally married to Arvind.
“We are not divorced yet but I will think about that later. For the moment, I want to spend time with my daughter,” Arvind said.