Hindus lured with fake promises of miracle healing and induced to convert to Christianity by Christian evangelists in Khatima, Uttarakhand
Khatima, Uttarakhand, India 
12 May, 2026
Case Summary
In Khatima, Uttarakhand, Hindu families were targeted for religious conversion to Christianity through false miracle-healing claims, inducements, and sustained pressure by local Christian evangelists. The matter came to light after a Hindu resident, Rampal, filed a complaint at the Khatima police station stating that Jai Singh Rana, Draupadi Rana, and Pastor Sunil George had been organising prayer meetings in the area while spreading propaganda against Hinduism and attempting to influence local Hindu families to abandon their faith. According to the complaint, the accused Christian evangelists approached vulnerable Hindu families and attempted to persuade them to convert to Christianity by promising miraculous cures for illnesses for their families, financial assistance, and relief from personal hardships. The complainant stated that his family was repeatedly pressured to embrace Christianity on the assurance that their medical and economic difficulties would be resolved through conversion and Christian prayer practices. The activities were presented in the form of prayer gatherings and faith-healing sessions, through which Hindu beliefs and practices were undermined while Christianity was promoted as a solution to suffering and poverty. Following the complaint, the police registered a case under the relevant legal provisions and initiated an investigation. Acting on the instructions of Udham Singh Nagar Senior Superintendent of Police Ajay Ganpati, authorities stated that strict action would be taken in all cases involving religious conversion through greed, fear, coercion, pressure, or false inducements. Police confirmed that a Special Investigation Team (SIT) was formed to ensure a fair and detailed probe into the incidents in all matters related to religious conversion that had surfaced in different areas of the district. The police action followed directions issued by Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, under whose instructions law enforcement authorities had begun treating religious conversion cases in the state with increased seriousness and scrutiny. SSP Ajay Ganpati stated that any attempt to convert individuals through inducement, intimidation, deception, or exploitation of vulnerability would invite strict legal consequences. Subsequently, investigations into the matter were initiated by the district police. This was not the first time that such incidents involving targeted conversion activities had surfaced in Uttarakhand. Hinduphobia Tracker had previously documented similar cases from different districts of the state. Earlier, in Deennagar village in the Nanakmatta area of Rudrapur, Uttarakhand, Hindu families were lured, threatened, and offered inducements for conversion to Christianity by Christian missionaries, following which police registered a case against nine named individuals on 5 April and began an investigation. Similarly, on 22 April 2026, Hindu tribal communities in Khatima and adjoining border areas of Uttarakhand faced sustained proselytisation campaigns carried out across multiple tribal-majority villages. Poor and economically vulnerable Hindu families residing in areas including Khetalsanda, Kham Pachauriya, Ganna Centre Halwari, Saina, Badi Baguliya, 22 Pul, and Bhudakishni were identified and targeted as part of an organised conversion drive conducted by Christian missionary groups operating in the region. In another incident reported on 30 April 2026 from Kanwali village in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, Hindu residents were offered inducements and influenced against their own religion for conversion by two Christian women. Police later registered a case under the Uttarakhand Religious Freedom Act, 2018, and initiated an investigation into the matter. The recurrence of such incidents across multiple districts contributed to growing concerns regarding organised and systematic religious conversion activities targeting vulnerable Hindu communities in Uttarakhand.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category- Predatory Proselytisation. The subcategory selected is- Conversion/attempts to convert by inducements. Predatory Proselytisation is not just limited to threat, harassment, force and violence, but it also has contours of stealth. In several cases, the Hindu victim is exploited to convert, with non-Hindus taking advantage of their poverty. In such cases, the Hindu victim who is suffering financially is offered monetary benefits, including lucrative offers for jobs, health treatment, education, etc, to induce the victim into changing his/her religion. In such cases, the religious identity of the victim and the aim to disenfranchise him from his faith form the heart of the crime. Also, taking advantage of and exploiting an individual’s economic vulnerabilities is widely acknowledged as exploitation, forms of which are often penalised by law. Such cases, therefore, are considered religiously motivated hate crimes since the victim’s religious identity forms the very heart of the crime itself. Another sub-category for this case is "Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation and subtle indoctrination". Within this, the tertiary category selected is- "Victim says was brainwashed/groomed" and "Pattern of targeting Hindus". Religious brainwashing essentially means the often subtle and forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up their religious beliefs to accept contrasting, regimented ideas. Religious grooming or brainwashing also involves propaganda and manipulation. It involves the systematic effort, driven by religious malice and indoctrination, to persuade “non-believers’ to accept allegiance, command, or doctrine to and of a contrasting faith. Cases of such grooming or brainwashing are far more nuanced than direct threats, coercion, inducement and violence. In such cases, it is often seen that there is repeated, subtle, and continual manipulation of the victim to induce disaffection towards their own faith and acceptance of the perpetrator's contrasting faith. While subtle indoctrination is widely acknowledged as predatory, an element which is often understated in such conversions or the attempts of such conversion is the role of loyalty and trust which might develop between the perpetrator and the victim. Fiduciary relationships are often abused to affect such religious conversion. For example, an educator transmitting religious doctrine of a competing faith to a Hindu student. The Hindu student is likely to accept what the teacher is transmitting owing to the existence of the fiduciary relationship. The exploitation of the fiduciary relationship to religiously indoctrinate victims would also be included in this category. Since the underlying animosity towards the victim’s faith forms the basis of predatory proselytisation, such cases are considered religiously motivated hate crimes. This case has been added to the tracker because Hindu families were targeted for religious conversion through inducements, psychological manipulation, and exploitation of vulnerability under the guise of miracle healing and prayer meetings. Firstly, the accused individuals deliberately approached economically and emotionally vulnerable Hindus and attempted to weaken their attachment to their faith by presenting Christianity as a solution to illness, poverty, and personal suffering. The promise that diseases would be cured, financial hardship would end, and lives would improve after conversion transformed religion into a transactional arrangement rather than a matter of genuine spiritual conviction. Such conduct exploited distress and insecurity to influence religious identity. Secondly, the use of prayer gatherings and faith-healing sessions demonstrated a structured and sustained effort to gradually influence Hindu families over time. These were not isolated religious interactions but repeated engagements designed to normalise conversion and create dependency on the evangelists. By repeatedly portraying Hindu beliefs as ineffective while presenting Christianity as superior and capable of delivering relief and miracles, the accused attempted to detach Hindus from their traditional faith and cultural roots. Further, the targeting of vulnerable sections of society showed that the conversion efforts were selective and strategic. Families struggling with illness, economic hardship, or social insecurity were identified as easier targets because material promises and emotional assurances carried greater influence over them. This undermined the possibility of free and informed consent, as the decision to convert became tied to desperation and the hope of escaping hardship rather than independent belief. Importantly, this was not an isolated incident. Similar patterns of conversion activities had already surfaced in multiple parts of Uttarakhand, including Rudrapur, Khatima border villages, and Dehradun. In each instance, vulnerable Hindus were approached through inducements, emotional manipulation, targeted outreach, or sustained persuasion aimed specifically at weakening Hindu religious identity. The recurrence of these methods across districts indicated an organised and continuing pattern rather than sporadic individual acts. Taken together, the use of inducements, miracle-healing claims, sustained psychological influence, and targeted outreach towards vulnerable Hindus established that this case was not about voluntary religious expression but about coercive and manipulative conversion practices directed at Hindus because of their religion. The conduct amounted to a direct attack on the religious identity and dignity of the Hindu community, bringing the case within the scope of a religiously motivated hate crime. Such predatory conversion efforts stem from Abrahamic doctrines like Christianity that view non-believers as spiritually deficient until they convert, fostering attitudes that encourage aggressive proselytisation directed at vulnerable Hindu communities. The Christian faith, by its very theological foundations, places a strong emphasis on proselytisation. In pursuit of conversion objectives, Christian evangelists often employ unethical means, ranging from psychological pressure and misinformation to inducements such as money or jobs. These tactics are designed not as acts of charity but as tools to engineer religious change under the guise of social upliftment, particularly among vulnerable and underprivileged communities. This systematic attempt to erode the religious foundation of individuals and replace it with allegiance to another faith reflects deep religious malice and animus against the Hindu identity. Because the core motivation of the act stems from hostility toward the victim’s religion, it meets the threshold of a hate crime. Hence, categorised as a hate crime in the database. Therefore, this case has been added to the Hinduphobia Tracker’s hate crime database. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incident dates based on when the crime occurred, not when it was reported or published. The exact date on which the conversion activity began was not confirmed in the source; therefore, the date when the report was published has been recorded as the indicative incident date for documentation purposes.
Case Status
Complaint filed
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Christian Extremists
Perpetrators Range
From 2 To 5
Perpetrators Gender
both
Sources 
