Muslim man pretends to be Hindu to lure Hindu nurse into sexual relation, tortures her to convert

Case ID : 242dffb | Location : Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Tue, 9 May, 2023

Case ID : 242dffb

Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, India

9 May, 2023

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Forced conversion before marriage

Forced to wear Hijab

Assault or threat upon refusal to convert

Case Summary

In Gwalior, a man named Aman Shah, who worked with a Hindu nurse in a private hospital befriended her by hiding his religion and pretending to be Aman Valmiki. He established sexual relations with her. When she put pressure on Aman for marriage, Aman told her that he was a Muslim and that if she wanted to marry, she would have to convert to Islam. According to the victim, when she opposed Aman's proposal of religious conversion, he started beating her and torturing her. The victim girl provided the police with a video. At the behest of Aman, his Muslim friend was also allegedly pressurising her to convert. The police have also found some photos in which the victim girl, despite being a Hindu, is seen wearing a hijab alongside the Muslim girl. He also threatened to make the obscene video viral. The victim complained to the Kampu police station.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

When a non-Hindu man pretends to be a Hindu to deceive a Hindu woman into a relationship, the act is seen as triggered by malafide intentions. In some cases, the woman eventually accepts the man’s original religious identity and converts after the man’s identity is revealed. These cases could be argued as cases of religious brainwashing and a result of the pressure a woman feels after getting into a relationship with a man. The woman, it can be argued, also changed her religious identity because of the stigma she believes she might face if she chooses to walk out of a deceptive relationship. However, for the purpose of documenting hate crimes, the cases in this subcategory are limited to those where there is explicit violence aimed at religious conversion against the wishes of the victim (force-feeding beef, blackmailing with intimate videos, rape on refusal to convert, etc), or if the woman herself complains of the man’s religious deception. In such cases, it is established that the deception of the non-Hindu man had a specific aim of religious conversion or targeting of the victim due to her Hindu religious identity, therefore, making it a religiously motivated hate crime. What gives this case a distinct religious angle is that the Muslim perpetrator actively hid his religion and pretended to be a Hindu to lure the Hindu victim. He pressured the victim to convert to Islam, forced her to wear a hijab and resorted to violence in a bid to pressure the victim to convert against her wishes. It is established that the Muslim perpetrator targeted the victim specifically owing to her religious identity and after that, tried to forcefully change her religious identity to Islam pointing towards a crime with his motivations being driven by religious hate.