Hindu woman from Chandigarh lured under false marriage promise, raped and coerced to convert to Islam

Case ID : 30a775d | Location : Chandigarh, Chandigarh, India | Date of Incident : Wed, 19 March, 2025

Case ID : 30a775d

Chandigarh, Chandigarh, India

19 March, 2025

Hindu woman from Chandigarh lured under false marriage promise, raped and coerced to convert to Islam

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Brainwashed and/or groomed

Rape and sexual assault/harassment

Victim says she was brainwashed/groomed

Forced conversion before marriage

Case Summary

A divorced Hindu woman from Chandigarh, working as a caretaker at a company, was befriended on social media by a Muslim youth named Zaheer from Dhond village, Firozpur Jhirka, Nuh district, Haryana. Zaheer made repeated false promises of marriage to cultivate her trust and lured her to his home on March 20, 2026. Once there, he raped her repeatedly over four days, pressured her to convert to Islam, and financially extorted one and a half lakh rupees from her. According to the complaint filed by the Hindu woman, Zaheer befriended her on social media approximately one year prior to the incident. The Hindu woman was divorced from her husband, had a son living with her maternal parents, and was working as a caretaker in Chandigarh. The friendship gradually developed into a romantic relationship during which Zaheer made repeated false promises of marriage. On March 20, 2026 he lured her to his home in Dhond village under the false promise of marriage. Once there, he raped her repeatedly over four days, pressured her to convert to Islam, and extorted one and a half lakh rupees from her. When Zaheer refused to follow through on his promise of marriage, the Hindu woman contacted Firozpur Jhirka police and reported the matter. Police registered a case against Zaheer under various sections, conducted a medical examination of the Hindu woman, and recorded her statement before the court. Zaheer remained absconding at the time of writing and two police teams were formed for his arrest. The investigation was ongoing as of the available sources.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category for this case is "Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes". The sub-category here is "Brainwashed and/or groomed". The tertiary categories here are "Rape and sexual assault/harassment" and "Victim says she was brainwashed/groomed". In our database, we have not added incidents where women have converted to another religion of their free will and no allegations of forced/involuntary conversion have been made. However, there are certain cases of conversion where the consent itself is a result of the brainwashing or grooming of a minor by the non-Hindu perpetrator trying to victimise a woman for her Hindu religious identity. The phenomenon of grooming points to non-Hindu perpetrators identifying their Hindu victims’ vulnerabilities and exploiting them over months and sometimes years, to extract the supposed ‘consent’ in order to convert their religion. In most cases of grooming, the victims are minors or the grooming started when the victim was a minor. In other cases of grooming, the non-Hindu perpetrator brainwashes and grooms a minor victim to extract their trust and then proceeds to rape them repeatedly with the intent of converting them to their faith. It is pertinent to understand here that when the victim is a minor, the ‘consent’ to convert or enter into a romantic relationship with an adult itself is redundant – addressed by POCSO. While every case of conversion of a minor and incidents of establishing a physical relationship with a minor by an adult is a crime, for the purpose of this database, a case would be considered a hate crime only if there is a distinct religious angle to the grooming. For example, in the UK, if a Hindu minor is targeted by Pakistani grooming gangs, it would be considered a hate crime because the victims are specifically targeted owing to their non-Muslim religious identity with the perpetrators being Muslim. In other cases, if a Hindu minor is brainwashed into entering a physical relationship with the non-Hindu adult perpetrator and the family alleges grooming/brainwashing of the minor to convert her religion, it would form a part of this database. If the victim is a Hindu adult, the case would form a part of this database only if the victim herself says that she was brainwashed/groomed to convert her religion. However, if the victim is deceased (murdered or otherwise), the case would form a part of this database if her family/friends provided testimony that the victim was brainwashed/groomed to convert her religion. Since these crimes have a distinct religious angle where the victim is being targeted owing to her Hindu religious identity, these cases are considered a hate crime. One other sub-category that this case qualifies for is "Forced conversion before marriage". In such cases, a non-Hindu man is in a relationship with a Hindu woman when the pressure to convert her religion begins to manifest. In such cases, typically, two patterns emerge. First, when the relationship is consensual, and the religious identity of the perpetrator is known to the Hindu woman in the relationship, however, at some point during the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts to force the victim to convert her religion and give up her Hindu religious identity. The second is when the woman gets into a marriage with the man pretending to share her faith. Later, when the truth is revealed, the man starts pressuring the woman to convert her religion and give up her religious identity. In both the situations, the methods used to force the victim to convert her religion often revolve around force-feeding beef, forcing her to wear hijab, forcing her to read the Kalma or even pressurizing the victim to do ‘Nikah’, which is marriage under Islamic law, with a prerequisite being conversion to Islam. Cases where a Hindu woman consensually converts to Islam in a relationship will be left out of the hate crime database, even though it could be argued in several cases that the conversion was a result of religious brainwashing. This case bears clear markers of a religiously motivated hate crime as it involves the systematic targeting of a Hindu woman through deception, sexual exploitation, and coercive pressure to convert her religion. The accused initiated contact under false pretences, built trust over an extended period, and used the promise of marriage as a tool to lure the victim, indicating premeditated manipulation rather than a consensual relationship. A key marker in this case is the element of religious coercion. The victim was not only subjected to repeated sexual assault but was also pressured to convert to Islam. This is crucial, as it establishes that the perpetrator had deliberately targeted a Hindu woman, with the intention of altering her religious identity. The demand for conversion demonstrates that her Hindu identity was not incidental but central to the crime, transforming it from an act of personal violence into one rooted in religious targeting. The victim’s circumstances further underline the predatory nature of the act. As a divorced woman living away from her family and working independently, she was in a vulnerable position, which the accused exploited. The deliberate use of emotional manipulation, followed by confinement, sexual violence, and financial extortion, shows a calculated pattern of control designed to overpower the victim both physically and psychologically. The use of false promises of marriage as a means to facilitate sexual exploitation and subsequent pressure for religious conversion reflects a broader pattern where trust is weaponised to target individuals from a specific religious community. The sequence of grooming, assault, and conversion pressure indicates that the crime was not isolated but part of a method where religious identity plays a defining role. Taken together, the deception, repeated sexual violence, financial exploitation, and coercive conversion attempts demonstrate that the act was rooted in hostility towards the victim’s religious identity and aimed at undermining her faith. It is therefore documented as a religiously motivated hate crime in the Hinduphobia Tracker database. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incident dates based on when a crime occurred, or a victim's ordeal began, rather than when the media reported it. The sources confirm that Zaheer first befriended the Hindu woman on social media approximately one year prior to March 20, 2026. Therefore, March 20, 2025 has been chosen as the indicative incident date as it represents the approximate date on which the Hindu woman's ordeal began through Zaheer's sustained social media grooming.