Hindu woman lured by Muslim man who falsely promised to convert to Hinduism and marry her; later pressured her to convert and undergo abortion
Haridwar, Uttarakhand, India 
30 March, 2026
Case Summary
A Hindu woman from the Jwalapur Kotawali area of Haridwar, Uttarakhand, was lured away from her home by a Muslim man who concealed his intentions behind a false promise to convert to Hinduism and marry her. Over the months that followed, he subjected her to prolonged harassment and pressure to convert to Islam. The perpetrator identified the Hindu woman and approached her with the deliberate intention of gaining her trust. He told her that he was prepared to convert to Hinduism and marry her as per Hindu rituals, presenting this promise as a sincere commitment. On the strength of this assurance, the victim agreed to leave her family home and go with him. Once she was separated from her family and living with him, the perpetrator began sexually abusing her. The abuse was not a single incident. It continued repeatedly over an extended period while he maintained the fiction that marriage was forthcoming, keeping her in the relationship through sustained deception. She became pregnant as a result of the abuse. The perpetrator did not acknowledge the pregnancy as grounds to proceed with the promised marriage. Instead, he obtained medication and administered it to her by force, without her knowledge or consent, causing her to miscarry. When the victim subsequently pressed him on the question of marriage, he dropped the pretence entirely. He refused to convert to Hinduism and reversed his position, placing pressure on her to convert to Islam. He started forcing her to marry him through nikah [Islamic marriage ceremony]. The deception, which had begun with a false offer of religious accommodation, ended with a coercive demand that she abandon her own faith. The victim returned home and disclosed the full account of what had been done to her. Her mother filed a written complaint with Jwalapur Kotawali police, stating that her daughter had originally been taken away through deception. The victim separately provided her own statement to police. The victim also identified a local municipal councillor in her complaint, stating that the councillor had provided active assistance to the perpetrator. The precise nature of that assistance was not detailed further in the source. Kotawali in-charge Chandrabhan Singh confirmed that the matter was under investigation.
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 "Family claims grooming", "Victim says she was brainwashed/groomed" and "Rape and sexual assault/harassment". 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. Another sub-category for this case 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 qualifies as a religiously motivated hate crime in which a Hindu woman was targeted, isolated, and abused through a calculated strategy of religious deception. The perpetrator's actions were not those of a failed relationship. They were premeditated, sustained, and structured around the victim's Hindu identity at every stage. The most important religious markers here are that the perpetrator falsely promised to convert to Hinduism and marry her, only to later pressure her to convert to Islam. The perpetrator's opening move was to present himself as willing to convert to Hinduism. This was not a sincere expression of intent but a deliberate exploitation of the victim's religious identity. He understood that a promise of conversion and marriage within a Hindu framework would be the most effective way to secure her trust and separate her from her family. Her Hindu faith was the instrument of her own entrapment. Once she was isolated from her family and living with him, he subjected her to repeated sexual abuse over an extended period. The abuse was made possible entirely by the religious deception that preceded it. Without the false promise constructed around her Hindu identity, she would not have left her home. The sexual violence was the direct consequence of a religiously motivated fraud. She became pregnant during this period. Rather than use the pregnancy as an occasion to honour his promise, the perpetrator forcibly administered medication to induce a miscarriage without her consent. This act eliminated physical evidence of the duration of the abuse and demonstrated that his only interest throughout had been exploitation. When she pressed him on the question of marriage, he revealed the true purpose of the relationship. He refused to convert to Hinduism, withdrew the promise of marriage entirely, and instead demanded that she convert to Islam. The deception had always been directional. It was designed to move a Hindu woman toward Islam through manufactured consent, and when that consent was withdrawn, coercion replaced it. The grooming dimension of this case is significant. The perpetrator did not act impulsively. He cultivated the victim's trust over months, maintained contact with her parents and relatives, and constructed a sustained fiction to keep her compliant. The victim's mother's complaint confirms that her daughter was taken away through deliberate and prolonged manipulation. This was not opportunistic exploitation but a structured campaign targeting a Hindu woman because of her religious identity and the vulnerabilities that identity created in the context of an interfaith approach. Given that this case met the parameters of a religiously motivated hate crime, it was added to the hate crime database of the tracker. Disclaimer: The HinduPhobia Tracker records incident dates based on when the crime occurred, not when it was reported or published. The source does not specify the exact date the abuse began; therefore, the publication date of 31 March 2026 has been used as the indicative incident date for documentation purposes. This was recorded for documentation purposes only.
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 1
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 0
Case Status
Complaint filed
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
