The High Court here ruled in favour of Goeswami Deva Singh A/L Bajan Singh, 40, who wanted to drop “A/L Bajan Singh” and add “Kairon”, a family surname, last November.
The national registration department (JPN) denied his request when he went to replace his MyKad. Goeswami then filed a judicial review application against the JPN director-general and the government.
Goeswami sought several legal remedies: a declaration of his new name; an order to quash JPN’s rejection; an order for the authorities to issue a new MyKad; and to register his new preferred name.
Justice Quay Chew Soon granted all the remedies sought in an online hearing today, with no order as to costs.
Goeswami, who works for an electronics firm in Germany, took part in the online hearing.
Quay said JPN’s decision to reject the name change was “unjustified and irrational”, and agreed with the submissions made by Goeswami’s lawyer, Shamsher Singh Thind.
Shamsher, in his submissions, said JPN’s rejection violated Goeswami’s fundamental right to freedom of expression as guaranteed by Article 10(1)(a) of the Federal Constitution.
He also said Goeswami’s name change did not involve a change of religion but was a personal decision to adopt a surname instead of his father’s name.
Shamsher had argued that the initial application for the name change was submitted in November 2023 and despite complying with the required laws, his client’s request was denied without a proper explanation.
JPN, in its defence, said it rejected the application as there was a lack of supporting documents since Goeswami’s parents and siblings did not carry the Kairon name as a family surname.
In an affidavit, JPN director-general Badrul Hisham Alias said there was also no proof of the Kairon family name on Goeswami’s birth certificate and the burden of proof fell on the applicant.
“As an analogy, if a person wants to change his gender from a man to a woman, but has not shown any document to support a reasonable change in the person’s gender, then such an application is not merited ab initio (from the onset) and should be rejected outright by JPN,” Badrul said.
In response, Goeswami said Badrul’s analogy “didn’t make sense”.
“I am not applying to change my surname (like I would if I was changing my gender). I am applying to replace my father’s name with my surname.”
In reply to the department’s claims, Shamsher said JPN received Goeswami’s application last November without communicating the need for supporting documents.
He said Goeswami was only told about the need for supporting documents in JPN’s defence of the suit.
Shamsher said Goeswami’s application should not have been accepted by JPN if it was deemed incomplete without a supporting document.
He said there are no laws prohibiting the name change except in the case of avoiding detection by authorities. He said his client’s application should have been processed without scrutiny unless explicitly prohibited by the law.
Federal counsel Nordiyanasari Omar appeared for JPN and the government.