Inspector-General of Police Khalid Abu Bakar said Muhammad Riduan Abdullah could have been easily caught if there was not this much publicity on his warrant of arrest.
He said ever since the court issued the arrest warrant against Riduan, previously known as K Pathmanathan, he seemed to have gone into hiding.
“Semua orang dah sibuk, dia lari lah (When everyone is busy talking about it, he flees).
“We have been tracing, tryng to arrest him. The issue is, we are not dealing with monkeys. You know, monkeys ‘pun susah nak tangkap’ (difficult to capture),” he told a press conference at Universiti Sains Malaysia.
Khalid said the authorities at all border checkpoints were on alert to prevent Riduan from leaving the country.
“Do not despair. Please do not accuse the police of purposely not arresting him and what not. We are taking the necessary steps.
“Anyhow, it is our responsibility to get him. We take this seriously. We don’t view this lightly as this is a High Court order.”
On Wednesday, Senior Federal Counsel Shamsul Bolhassan told Federal Court judges that Riduan was still in the country when queried why he was not present with his child, Prasana Diksa, now eight .
A five-man bench, chaired by Zulkefli Ahmad Makinudin, had completed hearing kindergarten teacher M Indira Gandhi’s appeal to nullify the conversion certificates of her three children in 2009.
Riduan, who became a Muslim, left Indira and then converted the children to Islam without her knowledge.
Riduan also took away Prasana Diksa, then 11 months. The other children Tevi Darsiny, 19, and Karan Dinish, 18, are under the custody of Indira.
In 2010, the Ipoh High Court granted Indira full custody of the children and ordered Riduan to return Prasana to the Hindu mother.
The High Court also quashed the children’s conversion certificates in 2013.
Last year, the Court of Appeal reversed the judgement of the trial court.
The Federal Court has reserved judgment in the case, now widely awaited by the public for its opinion on unilateral conversions.