Malaysia records 439,570 divorces from 2001 to 2015

The divorce rate in Malaysia has been increasing over the past years. The number of divorces in the nation gradually surged from 14,615 cases in 2001 to 45,951 cases in 2015.

In between those periods, there are years that Malaysia witnessed a decline in divorce cases, but then it increased in the following year. Such occurrences can be seen in the years; 2005, 2011 and 2013.

In 2001, the state with the highest number of divorce cases was Kelantan with 2,042 cases. Following was Selangor with 1,878 cases, behind Kelantan by only 164 cases.

However, Selangor swiftly overtook Kelantan in 2004. The number of divorce cases in Selangor escalated to 3,864 cases, while Kelantan had a slight reduction to 1,963 cases. Nevertheless, Selangor was not the only state that witnessed a rapid hike in divorce cases. A similar trend applied to Johor, Perak and Kuala Lumpur.

As the years go by, the number of divorce cases keep on escalating in most of the states and federal territories. In 2015, the trend of divorce cases in Malaysia by states were similar to their population size.

Unlike in the 2000s, the correlation between population size and divorce cases has become obvious today. This also indicated that Malaysians have been taking their marriages more lightly in the current decade as the number of divorce cases dramatically increased  across the nation.