Hindu girl befriended, sexually exploited and obscene photos clicked by Muslim man pretending to be Hindu in Indore

Case ID : 30a7a9c | Location : Indore, Madhya Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Mon, 6 April, 2026

Case ID : 30a7a9c

Indore, Madhya Pradesh, India

6 April, 2026

Hindu girl befriended, sexually exploited and obscene photos clicked by Muslim man pretending to be Hindu in Indore

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Pattern of targeting Hindu women

Brainwashed and/or groomed

Rape and sexual assault/harassment

Case Summary

In Indore, a Hindu girl was befriended by a Muslim man, Mohammed Rafiq, who pretended to be a Hindu man named Ayush. The accused lured the victim into a relationship and sexually exploited her. He also took multiple obscene photos and videos of her. According to media reports, this incident came to light when a few Bajrang Dal activists, activists of a Hindu organisation, caught hold of the accused. While the Bajrang Dal activists asked the accused to introduce himself, he said his name was Ayush. But later it was revealed that he was Rafiq. The accused accepted that he worked as a welder and that he hid his Muslim identity to trap the Hindu girl in a relationship. He had sexually exploited her and had taken almost more than 31 photos of her, which included several obscene photos as well. A video of this incident went viral, in which the accused accepted that he worked as a welder and hid his religious identity by pretending to be a Hindu, specifically to target multiple Hindu girls. The accused was also seen calling the Hindu victim his sister in front of the Bajrang Dal activists. The accused was further seen apologising to Bajrang Dal activists for his actions and issued a clarification that he would not repeat such acts in future. On social media, several Hindu users were outraged by this religious deception and entrapment of a Hindu girl and called for legal action against the Muslim perpetrator.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category selected in this case is- Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. The subcategory selected is- Man pretends to be Hindu. The tertiary categories selected are- Name Changed, Pattern of targeting Hindu women. 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 other subcategory selected is- Brainwashed and/or Groomed. The tertiary category selected is- 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. In this case, a Hindu girl was deceived into a relationship by a Muslim man pretending to be Hindu. After this, she was sexually exploited and obscene photos and videos were taken of her. These factors overall made this case a clear instance of a religiously motivated hate crime. Firstly, the perpetrator's act of deception by posing as a Hindu demonstrated a clear bias and malicious intent towards the victim’s religion. By hiding his true identity, the Muslim man manipulated the Hindu girl's trust and targeted her under false pretences, indicating a premeditated effort to exploit the girl based on her religious background. This constituted a direct violation of her right to informed consent regarding whom she entered a relationship with, as well as an infringement upon her religious beliefs. Thus, the perpetrator’s deliberate decision to hide his religious identity strongly underscored the religious motive behind this crime. In such instances, identity concealment was not just a deceptive tactic for personal reasons but a calculated strategy rooted in religious profiling and targeting. The accused was aware that the victim, being Hindu, would likely refuse his advances if she knew his real identity, and he circumvented this by lying, which directly pointed to a religiously driven intent. This deception reflected a larger pattern where Hindu girls are specifically singled out using false identities by Muslim men. Such targeted victimisation based on religion not only demonstrated a fundamental disregard for Hinduism but also exposed a deeper animosity toward Hindus and their beliefs. Under the pretext of a relationship and a false Hindu identity, the vulnerable Hindu girl was sexually exploited by the Muslim perpetrator. This sexual violence was not driven by mere sexual gratification but by a deliberate intent to dominate, degrade, and deeply humiliate a Hindu girl specifically because of her religious identity. Here, sexual violence functioned as a brutal tool to assert power over the victim, to strip her of dignity, and to target not just her personally but her entire Hindu community through this act of violation. Such targeted brutality against her faith transformed the assault into a clear case of religiously motivated sexual violence, fully aligning with established parameters of a hate crime. The capturing of multiple obscene photos and videos, over 31 in number, further showcased the deeply predatory nature of this crime. This deliberate documentation went beyond exploitation, serving as a means to blackmail, control, and repeatedly humiliate the victim long after the initial assault. By preserving these images, the perpetrator ensured ongoing trauma, stripping the Hindu girl of her agency and privacy while weaponising her vulnerability. This calculated escalation highlighted his intent to inflict lasting psychological harm, rooted in religious animosity rather than fleeting impulse. The accused's admission that he hid his identity specifically to trap many Hindu girls revealed a disturbing pattern of systematically targeting Hindu girls for deception and exploitation. This was not an isolated act but a repeated strategy to prey on Hindu girls, using false Hindu personas to gain trust before sexual violation. Such serial targeting based on religious identity exposed a broader agenda of religious hostility, where Hindu girls were profiled as easy marks for entrapment and degradation. This pattern cemented this incident as a religiously motivated hate crime, driven by animosity towards the Hindu community and their faith. Given that this incident met multiple parameters of a hate crime, it was added to the hate crime database of the Hinduphobia Tracker. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records the dates of incidents based on when the victim's ordeal began rather than when it was reported by the media. In this case, media reports did not mention the exact date when the victim's ordeal began. Hence, 7 April 2026, the date when the media first reported this incident, was recorded as the indicative incident date. This is recorded for documentation purposes only. Even though the perpetrator in this case admitted that he was posing as a Hindu to trap multiple Hindu girls, the total number of Hindu girls in total has not been specified in the report. It only refers to one particular girl. Hence, for the victim count, a conservative estimate of one victim has been selected. This is recorded for documentation purposes only.