Multiple Hindu women religiously profiled, forced into relationships, and blackmailed by Muslim gym operator in Gujarat’s Surendranagar
Surendranagar, Gujarat, India 
2 October, 2026
Case Summary
In Surendranagar, Gujarat, multiple Hindu women were religiously profiled and selectively targeted by Muslim gym operator Amin Multani. The accused secretly recorded obscene photographs and videos of Hindu women and girls inside the changing rooms of his gyms. The material was then used to force the victims into relationships, blackmail them and financially exploit them. According to media reports, Multani operated two gyms named Club 71, located on Dudhrej Road and 80 Feet Road in Surendranagar. More than 350 people regularly attended the two gyms, including a large number of women, particularly those from affluent families. Multani targeted women who visited the gyms and secretly recorded their photographs and videos inside the changing room. The victims were then blackmailed and forced into relationships, while money was also extorted from them. The matter came to light after a Hindu woman approached senior police officer Premsukh Delu and stated that illegal activities were taking place at the gym. She stated that Hindu girls were being blackmailed and forced into relationships, and that their photographs and videos were being recorded inside the changing room using hidden cameras. Following her complaint, police launched an investigation and conducted a night-time raid at the gym after posing as people interested in taking admission. During the operation, police seized a pen drive, blank cheques, an account diary and other material. Multani and a gym worker were subsequently arrested. Police said the pen drive contained photographs and videos of women, including nude images and videos. The material was sent to a forensic laboratory to determine its authenticity and establish whether the photographs and videos were genuine or generated using artificial intelligence. Police also said that the recovery of blank cheques and an account diary raised suspicion that the accused were involved in an illegal money-lending business. An initial investigation further indicated that Multani had started a money-lending business using money obtained through the extortion. Following the arrests, the Surendranagar Municipal Corporation sealed both gyms, while the electricity department disconnected their power connections. Deputy Mayor of the Surendranagar Municipal Corporation Smitaben Rawal stated that anyone compromising the safety of women would not be spared and that swift and strict legal action was being taken against those responsible. Local residents and Hindu organisations expressed outrage over the incident and demanded strict legal action against the accused. Vishwa Hindu Parishad Surendranagar Vice President Hemaben Joshi described the incident as an attack on the safety of Hindu women and called for strict action against those responsible. At the time of writing this report, further police questioning, forensic examination and investigation were expected to establish the authenticity and origin of the recovered material and reveal additional details regarding the blackmail, forced relationships and suspected money-lending activities.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case is being added to the tracker under the primary category: Attack not resulting in death. The subcategory 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. The other primary category selected is: Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. The subcategory selected is: Brainwashed and/or Groomed. The tertiary category selected is: Pattern of targeting Hindus. 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’ 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 incidents 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 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 a hate crime. This case represented a clear instance of a religiously driven hate crime, as the Muslim perpetrator selectively targeted Hindu women and girls for blackmail, financial exploitation and forcing them to enter relationships with him. The fact that the victims were specifically Hindu established a direct religious marker in the pattern of victimisation. Their religious identity was not incidental to the offences but formed the basis on which they were selectively profiled and subjected to this pattern of exploitation. Some might seek to dispute the religious motivation by characterising the incident merely as sexual harassment, blackmail, financial extortion or predatory behaviour driven by personal or financial motives. However, such a characterisation overlooks the specific pattern of victim selection. The perpetrator did not indiscriminately target women but specifically profiled Hindu women and girls, subjecting them to secret recording, blackmail, financial exploitation and forcing them to enter relationships with him. Had the conduct been motivated solely by sexual or financial gain, women would have been targeted irrespective of their religious identity. Instead, the selective profiling and exploitation of Hindu women demonstrated that their religious identity was relevant to their victimisation and was integral to the manner in which the offences were carried out. This distinguished the incident from a random sexual offence, generic financial extortion or ordinary predatory behaviour, and demonstrated hostility towards members of the Hindu community, giving the incident a distinct character of targeted religious persecution rather than an ordinary, religion-neutral offence. The fact that the Hindu women were also forced to enter relationships with the perpetrator further demonstrated the predatory nature of the targeting. A relationship between two adults should be based on free and informed consent, whereas the use of blackmail, obscene material and coercion to compel Hindu women into relationships transformed the relationship itself into a means of control and exploitation. More significantly, these coercive tactics were used specifically against Hindu women, indicating that their religious identity was relevant to their selection as victims. The use of such methods to lure and force Hindu women into relationships therefore went beyond ordinary personal or financial exploitation and reflected a targeted pattern in which Hindu women were specifically subjected to coercive relationship-based exploitation. This further reinforced the religiously driven nature of the crime, as the victims' Hindu identity formed part of the basis for their targeting. Notably, this was not the first instance in which Hindu women were selectively targeted by Muslim men operating or working at gyms. The Hinduphobia Tracker had previously documented several incidents in which Hindu women were subjected to sexual harassment, sexual exploitation and, in many cases, sexual exploitation coupled with attempts to convert them to Islam. These cases demonstrated a recurring pattern in which gyms were used as spaces to establish contact with Hindu women, gain their trust and subsequently subject them to various forms of targeted exploitation. For example, in March 2026, in Maratha Colony, Dharwad, several Hindu women were selectively targeted for sexual harassment by a Muslim gym trainer named Mohammad Sabir. Sabir worked as a trainer at Fitness First gym, where he repeatedly behaved inappropriately with female members, particularly Hindu women. Hindu victims stated that, under the pretext of providing training, he engaged in unwanted physical contact, including inappropriate touching, and subjected them to behaviour that made them uncomfortable and caused them mental distress. He repeatedly sexually harassed the women while operating in his capacity as a gym trainer. In another incident, in July 2026, in Saraswati Nagar of Davanagere district, Karnataka, multiple Hindu women were targeted and sexually exploited by a Muslim man named Mohammed Ismail, who owned and worked as a trainer at Power Fitness Gym. The incident further demonstrated how Hindu women were subjected to sexual exploitation in a gym setting by a Muslim gym operator. In January 2026, in Mirzapur district, Uttar Pradesh, several Hindu women were targeted, sexually exploited and blackmailed by a group of Muslim men who operated a religious conversion network under the guise of running gyms. The accused, identified as Mohammad Sheikh Ali Alam, Faisal Khan, Zaheer, Shadab and gang leader Imran Khan, operated local gyms named KGN-1, KGN-2, KGN-3 and Iron Fire. Under the guise of providing gym training, the accused befriended Hindu girls and women, established relationships with them and subsequently pressured them to convert to Islam. The case therefore involved not merely the exploitation of Hindu women but the use of a gym environment to facilitate targeted religious conversion. Similarly, in September 2026, in Govardhan, Mathura, Uttar Pradesh, a Muslim man named Salman targeted Hindu women while concealing his religious identity. He displayed tattoos depicting a Hindu deity and a peacock feather on his hand to gain their trust and lure them into relationships with the intention of converting them to Islam. The 40-year-old resident of Mukhrai village worked with his brother, Mustaq Khan alias Goli, and three associates, Shakir, Jalwa and Junoon. During police questioning, Salman disclosed that he and Mustaq had joined a gym in a neighbouring village to establish contact with a Hindu woman, further demonstrating how gym settings were used to facilitate contact with Hindu women in the context of targeted religious exploitation. Taken together, these previously documented cases demonstrated a recurring pattern of Hindu women being selectively targeted by Muslim men in gym environments for sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, blackmail and, in many cases, religious conversion. While the specific forms of exploitation differed from case to case, the repeated targeting of Hindu women indicated a broader pattern of victimisation in which their religious identity was relevant to the selection of victims. In this context, the Surendranagar incident formed part of a documented pattern of Hindu women being selectively targeted and exploited in gym settings. The specific targeting of Hindu women, coupled with the attempt to force them into relationships with the accused, further demonstrated that their religious identity was relevant to the nature and selection of the victims. As the Surendranagar incident demonstrated the selective victimisation of Hindu women on the basis of their religious identity, it met the parameters of a religiously motivated hate crime and was therefore added to the Hinduphobia Tracker's hate crime database. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incident dates based on when the victim's ordeal began, rather than when the incident was reported by the media. However, in this case, media reports did not specify the exact date on which the victim's ordeal began. Therefore, 3 October 2026, the date on which the incident was reported in the media, was selected as the indicative incident date for documentation purposes only. While this Tracker acknowledges that two individuals, including the primary accused Amin Multani and a gym worker, were arrested in connection with this case, the perpetrator count has been recorded as two for documentation purposes. The religion of the perpetrators has been recorded as Muslim based on the confirmed religious identity of the primary accused, Amin Multani. The religious identity of the second accused has not been independently verified at the time of documentation. However, as both individuals were arrested in connection with the same acts of blackmail and exploitation directed towards Hindu women, the case is recorded under a single perpetrator religion for consistency in categorisation.
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
From 2 To 5
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
