Hindu woman brainwashed, sexually exploited, forcibly converted to Islam, and compelled to undergo Nikah by a Muslim man
Baghpat, Uttar Pradesh, India 
18 May, 2026
Case Summary
In the Baghpat district of Uttar Pradesh, a Hindu woman was deceived, sexually exploited, forcibly converted to Islam, and compelled to perform Nikah by a Muslim man named Danish. The accused established contact with the victim and gradually drew her into a relationship by pretending a romantic relationship and assuring her that he would marry her. In her complaint to the police, the victim stated that she had met Danish a few months earlier. She stated that Danish first took advantage of her trust and borrowed money from her. He then drugged her and took her to a hotel, where she was raped. She also stated that Danish had made an obscene video of her and sexually assaulted her several times, threatening to make it viral. According to the victim, the accused repeatedly threatened to kill her if she resisted. Thereafter, he began pressuring her to abandon Hinduism and accept Islam. The victim stated that Danish, along with his father, Salim and brother Rihaan, took her to Baghpat. It was there that she was compelled to convert and perform Nikah with the accused. The victim stated that after the marriage, a witness informed her of the plot that Danish and his family had hatched in order to convert her religion. After the Nikah, the accused and his family began harassing and torturing her. She was subjected to continuous mental and physical abuse, and when she resisted and objected to the treatment meted out to her, the accused threatened to kill her and warned her against approaching the police or speaking about the abuse. According to her complaint, the relationship was used as a means to coerce her into religious conversion and Islamic marriage. She stated that she was manipulated emotionally, pressured religiously, and intimidated physically after the Nikah. Following her complaint, police registered a case under relevant sections related to forced religious conversion, intimidation, sexual exploitation, assault, and other applicable offences. Brijesh Kumar, the investigating officer in the case, stated that a case has been registered under relevant sections based on the woman's complaint.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category - Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. Within it, the sub-category selected is- Brainwashed and/or Groomed, with the tertiary category being - Rape and Sexual assault/harassment, and the victim says 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’ 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 are crimes, for 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 hate crimes. Another sub-category selected for this case is - Assault or threat upon refusal to convert. When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman faces threats or assault after she refuses to convert and change her religious identity owing to pressure/force by the non-Hindu man. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim. Somewhere along the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts pressurising the Hindu woman to convert to Islam and upon her refusal, assaults or threatens the victim. Such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim and are therefore qualified as hate crimes. Cases where the Hindu woman converts to Islam and does not file a complaint about the force or threat are not considered a part of the hate tracker, even though it may be argued that the woman was brainwashed or threatened to convert to Islam. The other sub-category selected is - Forced conversion before marriage, with the tertiary category being - Forced to do Nikah. 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 qualified as a religiously motivated hate crime because a Hindu woman was deliberately targeted by a Muslim man, emotionally manipulated into a relationship, sexually exploited with the ultimate goal of forcibly converting her to Islam, and compelling her to undergo Nikah against her will. The victim herself stated that the accused gradually pressured her to abandon her Hindu identity and accept Islam, establishing that religion was central to the abuse and coercion inflicted upon her. The first religious marker in this case was the grooming and emotional manipulation of the Hindu woman through the false promise of love and marriage. The accused built trust with the victim and established physical relations with her after assuring her of a future together. This was not a genuine relationship built on mutual respect. The relationship became a mechanism to isolate, emotionally control, and gradually prepare the victim for religious conversion. The victim’s account showed that the accused concealed his true intentions initially and only later began imposing pressure to change her religion. This demonstrated calculated grooming directed specifically at altering her Hindu identity. The second religious marker was the forced conversion to Islam and the compulsion to perform Nikah. The accused did not merely seek a personal relationship with the victim; he insisted that the relationship continue only after she abandoned Hinduism and accepted Islam. The coercion was therefore not incidental but directly linked to replacing the victim’s religious identity. Forcing a Hindu woman to renounce her faith and undergo Nikah under pressure constituted a direct attack on her religious freedom, dignity, and personal autonomy. The third religious marker was the continued harassment, abuse, and intimidation after the conversion and Nikah. The victim stated that she was subjected to mental and physical torture by the accused and his family members. When she resisted further pressure and objected to the abuse, she was threatened with death and warned against approaching the authorities. The violence escalated specifically when the victim no longer complied with the demands imposed upon her. This showed that coercion and intimidation were being used as tools to enforce submission after religious conversion had been secured. This incident was not an isolated interpersonal dispute but part of a broader pattern in which Hindu women are targeted through deception, emotional manipulation, sexual exploitation, and coercive conversion. In such cases, the relationship becomes a means to detach the victim from her Hindu identity and impose a new religious identity through psychological pressure, abuse, and fear. The targeting of Hindu women in this manner stemmed from hostility towards the victim’s professed faith and the belief that her existing religious identity needed to be erased and replaced. Since the victim explicitly stated that she was groomed, forcibly converted to Islam, compelled to perform Nikah, and threatened when she resisted, this case fulfilled the parameters of a religiously motivated hate crime and was therefore added to the hate crime database of the tracker. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incident dates based on when the victim's ordeal began, rather than when the media reported it. In this case, the report does not specify when the victim's ordeal began; therefore, the publication date, 18 May 2026, has been recorded as the indicative incident date for documentation purposes.
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
From 2 To 5
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
