What legal hurdles prevent stateless individuals like Velmurugan from gaining citizenship?

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Legal hurdles prevent stateless individuals like Velmurugan from gaining citizenship when parent citizenship status cannot be proven in court
Velmurugan, a 38-year-old stateless man, is challenging a High Court ruling that he must first prove his mother was a Malaysian citizen before he can be recognised as one. The National Registration Department had not determined his mother Balamah’s citizenship status due to inconsistencies in witness accounts about her birthplace and siblings, even though a DNA test verified their biological relationship. His High Court case was dismissed on May 19, 2025, and he is appealing at the Court of Appeal.
Citizenship registration under Article 16 hinges on proving the mother’s Malaysian status first
Velmurugan’s claim is tied to Article 16 of the Federal Constitution, which allows people born in Malaysia before Merdeka Day to be registered as Malaysians if they apply to the federal government and meet conditions such as good character. In his case, the High Court held that the facts did not show his mother was a Malaysian, so Velmurugan would remain a non-citizen like her. This turns the legal hurdle into a proof problem: the court requires the claimant to establish the parent’s Malaysian citizenship status before recognition is granted.
Inconsistent or missing documentation blocks NRD and court findings on citizenship status
Both Velmurugan and Balamah lacked birth certificates, with their births registered late with the National Registration Department in 2011 and 2019. The court record indicates this was linked to Balamah’s illiteracy and lack of awareness about birth registration. When NRD recorded Balamah’s citizenship status as “not determined,” it cited inconsistencies in testimony about her birthplace and number of siblings, which prevented a citizenship determination from being made administratively.
DNA proof supported parent-child identity, but did not resolve the citizenship-status question
A DNA test verified that Balamah was the biological sister of her Malaysian sibling and that Velmurugan was her biological child. However, NRD still had not determined Balamah’s citizenship status because the issue was not only biological linkage but also the factual basis for her citizenship in official records. The High Court’s May 19, 2025 ruling reflects that the legal hurdle remained unmet: proving biological relationship did not automatically establish the mother’s Malaysian citizenship.
Separate legal route under Article 15A still creates hurdles for other children born in Malaysia to unmarried parents
The Court of Appeal is also hearing five other citizenship cases with related legal themes, involving children born in Malaysia to Malaysian fathers and non-Malaysian mothers who were not married at the time of birth. In those cases, repeated applications under Article 15A were rejected because the government has discretion over registering those below age 21, with no guarantee of approval and decisions that can take years. The High Court also treated such children as “illegitimate” under its reading of constitutional principles, limiting inheritance of citizenship to the mother’s non-Malaysian citizenship rather than the Malaysian father’s, and it rejected arguments that the children would be stateless by asserting they would follow the mother’s citizenship.

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What legal hurdles prevent stateless individuals like Velmurugan from gaining citizenship?

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