Muslim man pretends to be Hindu to lure national-level baseball player, tortures her to convert to Islam, victim commits suicide
Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, India 
4 June, 2023
Case Summary
In Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, national-level baseball player Sanjana Barkade committed suicide by hanging herself on 5 June 2023 due to threats of religious conversion. Sanjana's mother claimed that Abdul Mansoori alias Rajan Khan was constantly pressurising her daughter to convert to Islam. He also spoke to the victim's mother on call and said "I want to marry her (Sanjana). If you do not accept our religion then we know where your home is. We will kill you." The deceased Sanjana's father said that Abdul had befriended his daughter by hiding his religion, but when she came to know the truth, she broke the friendship. Due to this, Abdul was enraged and used to torture her by threatening to leak her private photos and videos. He also stole her documents and the medals that Sanjana had won in her baseball competitions. When Sanjana asked for them, he told her to convert to Islam. Now the police of Sanjeevani Nagar station have arrested the accused.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
In this case, there are 3 distinct components which prove that the offence was committed coupled with a religious bias. The first sub-category in this instance is 'suicide for being forced to or pressured to convert.' When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman faces pressure/threats/violence to convert and change her religious identity by the non-Hindu man. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim. Somewhere along the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts pressurizing the Hindu woman to convert. In some of these cases, unable to bear the pressure/threat/violence being mounted by the non-Hindu partner to convert, the Hindu woman commits suicide. In such cases, often, threats are also given to the family members of the Hindu woman. Since such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim, leading to the woman committing suicide, these cases are categorized as hate crimes. The second sub-category applicable in this case is that the Muslim perpetrator pretended to be a Hindu. 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. The third sub-category which makes this case a religiously motivated hate crime is 'assault or threat upon refusal to convert'. When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman faces threats or assault after she refuses to convert and change her religious identity owing to pressure/force by the non-Hindu man. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim. Somewhere along the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts pressurizing the Hindu woman to convert to Islam and upon her refusal, assaults or threatens the victim. Such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim and are therefore qualified as hate crimes. Cases where the Hindu woman converts to Islam and does not file a complaint about the force or threat, are not considered a part of the hate tracker, even though, it may be argued that the woman was brainwashed or threatened to convert to Islam.
Victim Details
Total Victim
1
Deceased
1
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 1
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 0
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
