Hindu woman driven to suicide following deception under false pretences, forced prostitution, and pressure to convert to Islam by Muslim man

Case ID : 30aabc9 | Location : North 24 Parganas district, West Bengal, India | Date of Incident : Tue, 29 September, 2026

Case ID : 30aabc9

North 24 Parganas district, West Bengal, India

29 September, 2026

Hindu woman driven to suicide following deception under false pretences, forced prostitution, and pressure to convert to Islam by Muslim man

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Suicide for being forced to or pressured to convert

Case Summary

In Duttapukur, North 24 Parganas, a Hindu woman was deceived under false pretences by a Muslim man, Miraj Mondal. She was then forced into prostitution and pressured by him to convert to Islam before she died by suicide. The woman was found hanging at her home within the jurisdiction of Duttapukur Police Station. The incident was initially treated as a suicide, but circumstances surrounding her relationship subsequently caused tension in the area. On learning about the deception and attempting to leave the situation, she faced threats, blackmail, intimidation and continued harassment. Before her death, she recorded a video for social media in which she described the threats, intimidation, deception, harassment and pressure she had faced. A Hindu Jagaran Mancha activist said that she had also been subjected to pressure for religious conversion. The Muslim man, identified as Miraj Mondal, was named the principal accused. The woman had previously endured abuse and coercion and, during an earlier period of distress, had consumed sleeping pills and required hospitalisation. According to Joydip Biswas, a representative of the Hindu Jagaran Mancha Legal Cell, her family was involved in the matter, but police did not provide sufficient initial support and action. Biswas said a complaint about the case was filed on 30th September 2026, with lighter sections initially applied before the case was later upgraded. Duttapukur Police then arrested four people, namely, Miraj Mondal, Siraj Mondal, Marufa Bibi and Tania Khatun. Police identified Siraj as Miraj's father, Marufa Bibi as his mother, and Tania Khatun as his wife. The accused were booked under the relevant legal provisions, including provisions concerning abetment of suicide, and were forwarded to the Barasat Court. Following the incident, the Hindu Jagaran Mancha organised a protest march and a gherao of Duttapukur Police Station, demanding a proper investigation and exemplary punishment for those responsible. Protesters blocked the road outside the police station and burned tyres. On 4th and 5th of October 2026, hundreds of protesters and supporters gathered at the police station and in the surrounding area. Police subsequently increased security around Duttapukur Police Station, while senior officers met the protesters and assured them that action would be taken in accordance with the law. Kundan Mahato, a Hindu Jagaran Mancha activist, said discussions had been held with the Inspector-in-Charge (IC) and the Superintendent of Police (SP) offices regarding the organisation's demands. He said assurances had been given concerning the reassignment of the IC, Asif Khan, and the Investigating Officer (IO). Mahato also referred to similar incidents in Barasat, Ashoknagar, Habra and New Barrackpore and warned that, if strict and continuous measures were not taken, the organisation would stage a larger demonstration involving thousands of people outside the District Magistrate's (DM) office. Biswas, meanwhile, said the organisation's primary demand was that similar incidents should not recur and that police should take immediate action whenever such complaints were received.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category selected in this case is: Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. The subcategory selected is: Suicide for being forced to or pressured to convert. When Hindu women are in a relationship with a non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman faces pressure/threats/violence to convert and change her religious identity 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 pressurizing the Hindu woman to convert. In some of these cases, unable to bear the pressure/threat/violence being mounted by the non-Hindu partner to convert, the Hindu woman commits suicide. In such cases, often, threats are also given to the family members of the Hindu woman. Since such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim, leading to the woman committing suicide, these cases are categorized as a hate crime. The incident went beyond interpersonal abuse and involved deception, threats, blackmail, and pressure on the victim to convert to Islam. The prolonged abuse ultimately drove her to suicide, with her religious identity becoming a central element of the abuse she endured. The first religious marker lay in the deception and false pretences surrounding the relationship. The victim had been identified as a Hindu woman, while Miraj Mondal had been identified as a Muslim man. The significance of the deception went beyond personal betrayal because it had been followed by pressure connected to the woman’s religious identity. The relationship had therefore been portrayed as having drawn a Hindu woman into circumstances she had not knowingly or freely entered, after which her faith became part of the coercive situation she experienced. The deception was consequently treated as an important element in the wider religious dimension of the case. More significantly, the pressure to convert to Islam had directly concerned the victim’s identity as a Hindu and had therefore placed her religious affiliation at the centre of the abuse she experienced. The proposed conversion represented a demand for her to move away from Hinduism and adopt Islam, making her faith an explicit part of the coercive circumstances surrounding her. Such pressure had affected not merely a personal relationship but also her freedom to retain and practise the religious identity with which she had identified. The religious dimension had consequently involved pressure to abandon Hinduism in favour of Islam, rather than leaving her faith outside the conflict. In this context, the conversion pressure had constituted a direct challenge to the victim’s Hindu religious identity and had formed a distinct religious element of the wider abuse. These elements placed the victim’s Hindu identity at the heart of the circumstances she experienced, with deception and subsequent pressure to change her faith forming a connected religious dimension. The progression from being drawn into the relationship under false pretences to facing pressure to convert to Islam had affected her ability to retain her Hindu religious identity freely and without coercion. Accordingly, this case has been documented in the Hinduphobia Tracker's Hate Crime Database as an instance of religiously motivated hostility directed against Hinduism and the religious identity of the Hindu community. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incidents based on when an event occurred or when the victim's ordeal began. None of the media sources covering this case has specified the exact date the incident occurred. Therefore, for documentation purposes, we recorded the date as the date the FIR was registered: 30th September 2026.