Bangladesh: Hindu girl becomes victim of conversion gang, becomes third wife of Muslim man
Chittagong District, Bangladesh 
18 February, 2024
Case Summary
In Chattagram, Bangladesh, an 18-year-old Hindu girl named Pushpita Das was converted to Islam and married off to a 42-year-old Islamist Sabbir Chowdhury, who was already married with two wives. After her conversion, she was renamed Jannatul Naima Chowdhury. Pushpita's parents filed a case in the Chattagram District Court, alleging abduction and forced conversion. The court ordered the police to recover her, and she was produced before the court and sent into safe custody. Despite a large gathering of Islamists attempting to pressure the judiciary, the court did not hand her over to them. Hindu activists claimed that conversion gangs targeting young Hindu boys and girls were active in the district. Pushpita's parents urged the administration to return their daughter, emphasizing that she had been forcefully converted and married to a man with multiple wives.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
Religious brainwashing essentially means the often subtle and forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up their religious beliefs to accept contrasting regimented ideas. Religious brainwashing also involves propaganda and manipulation. It involves the systematic effort, driven by religious malice and indoctrination, to persuade “non-believers’ to accept allegiance, command, or doctrine to and of a contrasting faith. Cases of such brainwashing are far more nuanced than direct threats, coercion, inducement and violence. In such cases, it is often seen that there is repeated, subtle and continual manipulation of the victim to induce disaffection towards their own faith and acceptance of the contrasting faith of the perpetrator. While subtle indoctrination is widely acknowledged as predatory, an element which is often understated in such conversions or the attempts of such conversion is the role of loyalty and trust which might develop between the perpetrator and the victim. Fiduciary relationships are often abused to affect such religious conversion. For example, an educator transmitting religious doctrine of a competing faith to a Hindu student. The Hindu student is likely to accept what the teacher is transmitting owing to existence of the fiduciary relationship. The exploitation of the fiduciary relationship to religiously indoctrinate victims would also be included in this category. Since the underlying animosity towards the victim’s faith forms the basis of predatory proselytization, such cases are considered religiously motivated hate crimes. This particular case has been classified as a religiously motivated hate crime under the core category of Predatory Proselytisation because there is a distinct component in this case, which essentially involves brainwashing a non-Muslim to abandon his faith and begin practising the alien faith, that demonstrates the perpetrator's bias against the Hindu faith and his deliberate attempt to alienate the victims from their Hindu identity.
Victim Details
Total Victim
1
Deceased
0
Gender
- Male 0
- Female 1
- Third Gender 0
- Unknown 0
Caste
- SC/ST 0
- OBC 0
- General 0
- Unknown 1
Age Group
- Minor 0
- Adult 0
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 1
Case Status
Complaint registered
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
N/A
Perpetrators Gender
unknown
Sources 
