Hindu man deceived into marriage by Muslim woman posing as Hindu in Solapur, Maharashtra

Case ID : 30a8152 | Location : Solapur, Maharashtra, India | Date of Incident : Wed, 22 April, 2026

Case ID : 30a8152

Solapur, Maharashtra, India

22 April, 2026

Hindu man deceived into marriage by Muslim woman posing as Hindu in Solapur, Maharashtra

Men attacked for being associated with non-Hindu women

Brainwashed and/or groomed

Case Summary

In Maharashtra's Solapur district, a Hindu man was deceived by a Muslim woman, who posed as a Hindu to get married into the family. On the fourth day after the wedding, she quietly gathered the family's valuables and attempted to slip away. The groom noticed in time, chased her and apprehended her. The investigation that followed exposed an organised gang that had been systematically targeting simple and unsuspecting Hindu young men who were looking for a bride. The woman had been presented to the Hindu groom and his family as a Hindu girl, belonging to the Maratha community, one of the most prominent and widely respected Hindu communities in Maharashtra. The family welcomed her into their home in the full belief that she was a Hindu woman entering into a legitimate Hindu marriage. No indication of her true religious identity was disclosed at any point before or during the wedding. Four days after entering the Hindu household as a bride, Kusumben Bemabhai Ghatad gathered the family's valuable belongings and attempted to leave the home quietly without alerting anyone. The groom noticed her departure in time, pursued her, and brought her back. When the matter was investigated thoroughly, the truth emerged. The woman presented as a Hindu bride was in reality a Muslim. Furthermore, she was already married and had children from her existing marriage, confirming that the Hindu wedding had been entered into fraudulently from the outset. The investigation revealed that the fraud was not the act of one individual operating alone. An organised gang had been operating a systematic scheme of targeting Hindu men who were searching for a bride, presenting Muslim women with false Hindu identities to gain entry into Hindu households, and exploiting those households through theft and deception before disappearing.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category for this case is "Men attacked for being associated with non-Hindu women". The sub-category for this case is "Brainwashed and/or groomed". In our database, we have not added incidents where men 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 man for his 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 incident 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 himself says that he was brainwashed/groomed to convert his religion. However, if the victim is deceased (murdered or otherwise), the case would form a part of this database if his family/friends provided testimony that the victim was brainwashed/groomed to convert his religion. Since these crimes have a distinct religious angle where the victim is being targeted owing to his Hindu religious identity, these cases are considered hate crimes. In this incident, a Muslim woman operating as part of an organised gang, deliberately concealed her Muslim identity and presented herself as a Hindu bride to a Hindu family, and was apprehended on the fourth day when she attempted to leave with the family's valuables. The core of the crime was the deliberate and premeditated concealment of a Muslim identity behind a fabricated Hindu one, used to gain unconditional access to a Hindu household through the most sacred institution in Hindu family life. This case reflects a structured act of identity-based deception in which religious identity played a functional role in both access and execution. The accused was reportedly part of an organised group engaged in similar operations, indicating that the incident was not isolated but part of a patterned method. The use of a consistent approach suggests deliberate targeting, where deception is carefully designed to exploit predictable points of trust within households. Central to this method was the concealment of the accused’s real identity and the adoption of a Hindu identity to gain entry into a Hindu family. This was not incidental. It demonstrates a clear understanding that shared religious identity acts as a key basis for trust, particularly in the context of marriage. By presenting herself as a Hindu bride, the accused was able to bypass social and familial safeguards that would otherwise apply to an outsider. It is important to mention here, that for the Muslim woman, it would have been easier to operate within her own community, but the fact that she chose to impersonate a Hindu identity to gain access into a Hindu household indicates a premeditated approach in which Hindus were specifically targeted through identity-based deception. The choice of this specific form of impersonation is significant. Marriage is one of the most trusted and culturally sensitive institutions within families, where verification is often grounded in perceived social and religious alignment. By exploiting this framework, the accused was able to integrate into the household, observe its functioning, and position herself to access valuables. The deception was sustained over multiple days, pointing to planning and intent rather than a spontaneous act. The organised nature of the activity further reinforces that this was not random opportunism. The reliance on religious identity as a tool to facilitate entry suggests a calculated assessment of where such deception would be most effective. Identity, in this case, was not incidental to the crime but integral to how it was carried out. Beyond the attempted material loss, the incident also results in a deeper breach of trust. When identity is used in this manner, it creates lasting psychological and social consequences, particularly in spaces where familial and cultural bonds are expected to provide security. Taken together, the organised execution, the deliberate concealment and fabrication of identity, and the targeted use of a Hindu identity to access a Hindu household demonstrate that religion functioned as a key enabling factor in the crime. Such deliberate misuse of religious identity reflects a disregard for the beliefs and trust structures associated with that faith. While the immediate objective may have been material gain, the method relied on identity-based deception, making this case relevant for documentation in the tracker.