SUPPORT is growing for three women camped outside the federal police headquarters in Bukit Aman who have vowed not to leave the site or eat until their husband are freed.

Scores of well-wishers have come to offer the wives moral support, urging the women to stay strong.

The three women have slept on the concrete pavement for five days now, hoping to pressure the police into releasing their husbands, who are detained under the Security Offences and Special Measure Act (Sosma) 2012, before Deepavali.

V. Umahdevi, wife of Gadek assemblyman G. Saminathan, said that since their protest started, more than 200 people have visited them.

She said people from as far as Ipoh and Malacca have come to see them, and many are from the Klang Valley.

“We are very touched by all the moral support that we are getting.

“We want Malaysians to know what we are facing here. We will not move until they are released,” Umahdevi told The Malaysian Insight.

Their husbands were detained over suspicion of having ties to the long-defunct Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) of Sri Lanka.

The other two women are J. Vimala Devi, wife of local councillor V. Suresh Kumar, and Sumadi whose husband is Green Technology Corporation CEO S. Chandru. Both are from Malacca.

Earlier, Inspector-General of Police Abdul Hamid Bador said  the 12 suspects will be allowed to see their families on Deepavali.

He said only the immediate family could visit the detainees at the detention centre.

Umahdevi said a visit was pointless as he was needed to attend prayers at the temple on Deepavali.

“What’s the point, when I can’t go to the temple with husband for prayers?.

“Even if we visit, we will have a limited amount of time with him. We want him back for Deepavali,” she said.

Vimala expressed her gratitude to all their well-wishers.

“We don’t know until when we will be here, but we will continue to hold on until they are all released,” she said.

She said she did not know what to tell her three children, aged 3 to 5,  when they visit their father on Sunday.

“They have been asking for their father and I told them he was overseas. Now they are coming to visit him and I don’t know what to say,” she said.

On the latest developments in the case, Hamid said the investigation papers had been submitted to the Attorney-General’s Chambers for further action.

“Police are awaiting feedback from the attorney-general,” he said.

The 12 individuals were detained for 28 days under Sosma and the detention period will end on November 6 and 8, depending on the date of their arrest on either October 10 and 12. – October 25, 2019.