Hindu woman deceived into marriage by Muslim man feigning Hindu identity on Instagram, found dead after discovering husband's true identity

Case ID : 30a9084 | Location : Rewa, Madhya Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Tue, 24 March, 2026

Case ID : 30a9084

Rewa, Madhya Pradesh, India

24 March, 2026

Hindu woman deceived into marriage by Muslim man feigning Hindu identity on Instagram, found dead after discovering husband's true identity

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Attack resulting in death

Attacked for Hindu identity

Case Summary

A Hindu woman from Rewa, Madhya Pradesh, died under unexplained circumstances after entering a relationship and marriage with a Muslim man from Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, who had contacted her using a Hindu identity on social media. Her family lost contact with her after she left with him, and later learned of her death and burial. The circumstances surrounding her death remained unclear, prompting her family to seek answers and request further investigation. The Hindu victim, identified as Goldie, aged 20, was the daughter of Tirath Saket and a resident of Tamri village in the Govindgarh area of Rewa district, Madhya Pradesh. A few years earlier, she had worked in a biscuit factory in Hyderabad. During this period, she came into contact with a Muslim man from the Jari Bazaar area of Kaundhiyara in Prayagraj district, Uttar Pradesh. The Muslim man worked at a tailor's shop in Hyderabad and established contact with her through an Instagram account operated under a Hindu name. The interaction gradually developed into a personal relationship. The Hindu woman remained in contact with the Muslim man over an extended period, during which the relationship deepened. The family later learned that the Muslim man had concealed his religious identity while communicating with her and had presented himself as a Hindu on social media. The relationship eventually culminated in marriage, which took place approximately six months before her death. On 25th March 2026, the Muslim man took the Hindu woman with him. After this, her family was unable to contact her. Communication with the Hindu woman ceased, and her relatives remained unaware of her whereabouts and circumstances. During this period, she was no longer in regular contact with her family in Rewa. Subsequently, the Hindu woman's family discovered that she had entered into marriage with the Muslim man. Information later emerged that she had been taken to Surat after learning his actual religious identity. Her family stated that disputes arose after she learned the man was not Hindu. They further stated that she faced harassment from members of his family after the marriage. On 10th May 2026, the Hindu woman died under circumstances that remained unexplained. Following her death, her body was buried in a cemetery. Her family was not informed about the burial at the time it took place. The circumstances leading to her death and the events immediately preceding it remained the subject of scrutiny by her relatives. Several weeks later, a woman informed the Hindu victim's family that their daughter's body had been buried in a cemetery following her death. Upon receiving this information, the family travelled to Prayagraj and approached the authorities seeking intervention. They raised concerns regarding the circumstances of her death and the concealment of information relating to her burial. Following the family's complaint, the authorities initiated action. On 16th June 2026, approximately 35 days after her death, the Hindu woman's body was exhumed from the cemetery, and a post-mortem examination was conducted. The examination did not immediately establish a definitive cause of death. Her mother and younger sister maintained that the Muslim man was responsible for her death and stated that she had faced difficulties after discovering his true identity and after becoming pregnant. The matter remained under investigation. The body had been exhumed and subjected to post-mortem examination, but the cause of death had not yet been determined. Police stated that the Hindu woman had died on 10th May 2026 and confirmed that the exhumation and post-mortem had taken place on 16th June 2026. They further stated that legal action would proceed on the basis of evidence emerging from the ongoing investigation.

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 this, the selected sub-category is - Man pretends to be Hindu. Under this, the tertiary category is - Name changed. 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 primary category selected here is - Attack resulting in death. Within it, the sub-category selected is - Attacked for Hindu identity. In several cases, Hindus are attacked merely for their Hindu identity without any perceived provocation. A classic example of this category of religiously motivated hate crime is a murder in 2016. 7 ISIS terrorists were convicted for shooting a school principal in Kanpur because they got ‘triggered’ seeing the Kalava on his wrist and tilak that he had put. In this, the Hindu victim had offered no provocation except for his Hindu religious identity. The motivation for the murder was purely religious, driven by religious supremacy. Such cases where Hindus are targeted merely for their religious identity would be documented as a hate crime. Under this category, cases where the attack led to the death of the Hindu victim/s would be documented. The religious motive of the crime is evident from the fact that the Muslim perpetrator deliberately hid his real identity and pretended to be a Hindu in order to gain the trust of the Hindu victim. If religion had no role in the crime, there would have been no need for him to conceal his faith and present himself as a Hindu. The deception worked precisely because he knew that sharing the same religious identity would make the victim more comfortable, trusting, and willing to interact with him. This makes the victim's Hindu identity central to the offence. The perpetrator did not simply lie about his name or personal details. He specifically used a false Hindu identity as a tool to approach, manipulate, and exploit a Hindu victim. The fact that he felt the need to pose as a Hindu shows that he understood the importance of religion in the victim's life and deliberately exploited it for his own benefit. The deception also reflected a deeper disregard for Hindu beliefs and community trust. Rather than respecting the victim's religious identity and her right to make informed choices, the perpetrator treated her faith as an obstacle to be bypassed through dishonesty. Hindu identity was reduced to a disguise that could be adopted whenever it became useful. Such conduct demonstrates contempt for the religious boundaries, customs, and values that the victim was entitled to rely upon while deciding whom to trust. It is also significant that the perpetrator specifically targeted a Hindu victim through a fabricated Hindu identity. The entire deception depended upon exploiting the trust associated with being Hindu. This shows that the victim's Hindu identity was not incidental to the crime but one of the factors that made her a target. The perpetrator consciously chose a method that weaponised Hindu identity itself in order to gain access, influence, and control. For this reason, the offence carries clear religiously aggravating elements. The perpetrator's ability to target and exploit the victim depended on religious deception and the manipulation of trust associated with Hindu identity. This demonstrates that the victim's religion was not incidental to the crime but one of the key factors that enabled it. In cases like these, the tactic of adopting a false Hindu identity to manipulate and "ensnare" a Hindu individual is not just an act of personal betrayal but can also be interpreted as an expression of disdain or disregard for Hinduism and its customs that reflects a deeper animosity towards Hindus and their beliefs. Another important aspect of this incident is that, according to the victim's family, tensions arose after she discovered that the man who had presented himself as Hindu was in fact Muslim. The family further stated that she faced harassment from members of his family following the marriage. These facts are significant because they suggest that the concealment of religious identity was not a peripheral detail but a central feature of the relationship and the events that followed. The exploitation of religious trust, the concealment of identity, the subsequent marital conflict, and the circumstances surrounding her death collectively establish sufficient religiously aggravating elements to warrant inclusion in the tracker. The victim was not targeted as a random individual; she was approached as a Hindu woman through a strategy that depended upon manipulating and exploiting her religious identity, making the religious dimension central to understanding the nature of the case.