Hindu woman deceived into marriage, pressured to convert to Christianity by Christian man posing as Hindu in Ajmer

Case ID : 30a9b4a | Location : Ajmer, Rajasthan, India | Date of Incident : Mon, 15 May, 2023

Case ID : 30a9b4a

Ajmer, Rajasthan, India

15 May, 2023

Hindu woman deceived into marriage, pressured to convert to Christianity by Christian man posing as Hindu in Ajmer

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Forced conversion after marriage

Assault or threat upon refusal to convert

Case Summary

In Ajmer, Rajasthan, a Hindu woman was deceived into marrying a Christian man who, along with his family, concealed their religious identity by posing as Hindus. After the marriage, when she discovered that her husband and his family were Christians, she was repeatedly pressured to convert to Christianity and attend church services. When she refused to renounce her Hindu faith, she was subjected to physical assault, harassment, dowry-related abuse, threats of divorce, and was eventually driven out of her matrimonial home. She also revealed that her husband forced her into unnatural sexual acts, secretly recording obscene videos of her, threatening to circulate them on social media, and stating that he had sold such videos for money. According to the victim, she married a man who was a resident of Parbatpura on 16 May 2023. A few months after the marriage, during the Diwali festival, she discovered Christian religious material inside her matrimonial home. When she questioned her husband and his family about it, they informed her that they were Christians and did not believe in Hinduism. They further told her that she would have to convert, attend church every Sunday and participate in Christian prayers. When she refused to convert to Christianity, she was physically assaulted and subjected to continuous harassment. The victim further stated that her husband was addicted to alcohol and, while intoxicated, forced her into unnatural sexual acts. She stated that he secretly recorded obscene videos of her without her knowledge. On one occasion, he showed her one such video on his mobile phone and stated that he had recorded several similar videos, sold them for money, and would make them viral on social media if she opposed him. The woman also stated that her husband was involved in an extramarital relationship with a neighbouring woman. When she informed her in-laws about the affair, an altercation followed, during which her mother-in-law, sisters-in-law, her sister-in-law's daughter, and other female relatives assaulted her. According to the complaint, her in-laws took ₹2.85 lakh from her on the pretext of constructing a separate house. In addition, her father was made to pay ₹5 lakh in cash, following which the plot was registered in her mother-in-law's name. Thereafter, she was pressured to bring an additional ₹25 lakh as dowry. When the demand was not fulfilled, she was threatened with divorce and told that her husband would be married to another woman. The victim stated that on 17 July 2026, she was again assaulted while being pressured to bring ₹25 lakh from her parental family. Following the assault, she was driven out of her matrimonial home. Based on the victim's complaint, the Sadar Police registered a case against her husband and members of her matrimonial family under the relevant provisions of law. The police initiated an investigation into the matter.

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 subcategory selected is: Man pretends to be Hindu. 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 malicious 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 in this case is: Forced conversion after marriage. In such cases, a non-Hindu man marries a Hindu woman, and the force/pressure to convert to any Abrahamic faith, like Islam, begins after marriage. 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. The marriage could be under the Special Marriages Act, where neither party is required to convert their religion for the marriage to be considered legitimate. While the victim in such cases enters matrimony assuming that religious identity is not a barrier, the non-Hindu man starts to pressure the woman to convert her religion after marriage. 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 situations, there is application of force by the perpetrator, including the denial of the woman’s religious rights. Some of the means by which the woman is forced/pressured to convert include force-feeding beef, being forced to read the Kalma, being forced to wear a hijab, being forced to undergo Halala, etc. There are several instances where, after marriage, the woman voluntarily converts to Islam. Such cases are often argued to be a result of religious brainwashing; however, for the purpose of documenting religiously motivated hate crimes, in the absence of the victim complaining of forced conversion, such cases do not form a part of the database. Another sub-category 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. In this case, the Hindu woman was deceived into marrying a Christian man who, along with his family, concealed their religious identity by posing as Hindus. Following the marriage, she was pressured to convert to Christianity and was subjected to physical assault and harassment when she refused to renounce her Hindu faith. Taken together, these actions make this a clear example of a religiously motivated hate crime. Firstly, the perpetrators' act of deception by presenting themselves as Hindus demonstrated a clear bias and malicious intent towards the victim's religion. By hiding their true religious identity, the Christian man and his family manipulated the Hindu woman's trust and targeted her under false pretences, indicating a premeditated effort to exploit her based on her religious background. Furthermore, the marriage legitimised the relationship in the eyes of the woman and the wider Hindu community. This constituted a direct violation of her right to make an informed decision regarding whom she chose to marry, as well as an infringement upon her religious beliefs. Thus, the deliberate decision of the Christian man and his family to conceal their religious identity strongly underscored the religious motive behind this crime. In such instances, identity concealment is not merely a deceptive tactic for personal reasons but a calculated strategy rooted in religious profiling and targeting. The accused were aware that the victim, being Hindu, would likely have refused the marriage had she known their true religious identity, and they circumvented this by falsely presenting themselves as Hindus, which directly pointed to a religiously motivated intent. This deception reflected a broader pattern in which Hindu women were specifically targeted through false religious identities, often with the objective of facilitating subsequent religious coercion or conversion. Such targeted victimisation based on religion not only demonstrated a fundamental disregard for Hinduism but also exposed a deeper animosity towards Hindus and their beliefs. Following the marriage, the Christian man and his family began pressuring the Hindu woman to convert to Christianity. This sequence of events is significant because it demonstrates that the perpetrators exploited the victim's vulnerability after marriage to target her for religious conversion. In Indian society, marriage is regarded as a sacred and enduring institution, and the breakdown of a marriage often carries significant social stigma, particularly for women. By concealing their religious identity until after the marriage and only then insisting that the victim abandon her faith, the perpetrators placed her in a position where resisting their demands meant risking the collapse of her marriage and the accompanying social consequences. This demonstrates a calculated attempt to exploit the victim's marital circumstances to coerce her into abandoning her Hindu faith. The perpetrators did not merely express a preference for their own religion but actively sought to compel the victim to renounce Hinduism and embrace Christianity. After revealing their true religious identity, they informed her that she would have to attend church every Sunday and participate in Christian prayers, making it clear that she was expected to practise Christianity instead of her own faith. Such acts amounted to an attempt to force a Hindu woman to abandon her religion and adopt another through coercion. Compelling an individual to give up their faith and participate in the religious practices of another religion violates their religious autonomy, freedom of conscience, and fundamental right to practise the religion of their choice. Such coercive attempts at religious conversion constitute a clear example of a religiously motivated hate crime. When the victim refused to convert to Christianity, she was subjected to physical assault and continuous harassment by her husband and his family. The violence was not incidental but directly followed her refusal to renounce her Hindu faith, establishing a clear nexus between the abuse and her religious identity. Punishing a person for choosing to remain faithful to their religion reflects hostility towards that religion and an intolerance of their right to practise it. The assault and harassment inflicted upon the victim for refusing conversion demonstrate that the perpetrators were prepared to resort to violence to strip her of her Hindu identity and compel her to embrace Christianity. Such conduct clearly reflects religious hostility and makes this a religiously motivated hate crime. Apart from the religious coercion, the victim was subjected to a series of other grave forms of abuse that further aggravated the seriousness of the offence. She stated that her husband forced her into unnatural sexual acts, secretly recorded obscene videos of her, threatened to circulate them on social media, and stated that he had sold such videos for money. She was also subjected to dowry-related harassment, financial exploitation, repeated physical violence, threats of divorce, and was ultimately driven out of her matrimonial home. These acts demonstrate that the victim was subjected to sustained physical, sexual, emotional, and economic abuse, substantially increasing the gravity and severity of the crime. Overall, since the facts of this case satisfy the parameters of a religiously motivated hate crime, it is being included in the Hinduphobia Tracker database. Disclaimer: Hinduphobia Tracker records incidents based on the date on which the victims' ordeal began. In this case, although the reported acts of coercion and abuse continued over a period of time, the victim's ordeal commenced with her marriage on 16 May 2023, which has therefore been recorded as the date of the incident. The perpetrator count was recorded as 5 (five), based on the five perpetrators specifically named by the victim in her complaint at the time of writing this report. This count may be revised if subsequent investigation identifies additional accused or results in any change to the list of named perpetrators.