Hindu woman trapped through financial inducements, brainwashed to convert to Christianity; barred from meeting family
Maharajganj, Uttar Pradesh, India 
18 October, 2026
Case Summary
In the Bhitoli police station area of Maharajganj district, Uttar Pradesh, a Hindu woman, Aastha Yadav, was lured with money, brainwashed and forced to convert to Christianity. The victim was prevented from returning home and was subjected to physical and mental exploitation by a Christian man and a woman. According to the complaint submitted by Annu Yadav, sister of the victim, a resident of Bishunpur Bhadehar village under Sinduria police station, the accused woman Mudila Chaudhary lured the victim to her house and brainwashed her with financial inducements. The accused woman then introduced the victim to a Christian man from Jadar in the Bhitoli police station area who was involved in religious conversion activities. The complainant stated that the Christian accused had been facilitating religious conversions for several years. She further stated that the accused woman and the Christian man were acting together to prevent the victim from returning to her family through deceptive means. The complaint also stated that the victim was being subjected to physical and mental exploitation. The victim's family expressed distress over the matter and sought police intervention. Annu Yadav submitted a written complaint to the Bhitoli station house officer, demanding appropriate action against the accused. Bhitoli station house officer Satyendra Kumar Rai confirmed that the police had received the complaint. He said the police would investigate and take necessary legal action.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case is being added to the tracker under the primary category: Predatory Proselytisation. The subcategory selected is: Conversion/attempts to convert by inducement. Predatory Proselytisation is not just limited to threat, harassment, force and violence, but it also has contours of stealth. In several cases, the Hindu victim is exploited to convert, with non-Hindus taking advantage of their poverty. In such cases, the Hindu victim who is suffering financially is offered monetary benefits, including lucrative offers for jobs, health treatment, education, etc, to induce the victim into changing his/her religion. In such cases, the religious identity of the victim and the aim to disenfranchise him from his faith form the heart of the crime. Also, taking advantage of and exploiting an individual’s economic vulnerabilities is widely acknowledged as exploitation, forms of which are often penalised by law. Such cases therefore are considered religiously motivated hate crimes since the victim’s religious identity forms the very heart of the crime itself. The other subcategory selected is: Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination. The tertiary category selected is: Family claims grooming. Religious brainwashing essentially means the often subtle and forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up their religious beliefs to accept contrasting regimented ideas. Religious grooming or brainwashing also involves propaganda and manipulation. It involves the systematic effort, driven by religious malice and indoctrination, to persuade “non-believers’ to accept allegiance, command, or doctrine to and of a contrasting faith. Cases of such grooming or brainwashing are far more nuanced than direct threats, coercion, inducement and violence. In such cases, it is often seen that there is repeated, subtle and continual manipulation of the victim to induce disaffection towards their own faith and acceptance of the contrasting faith of the perpetrator. While subtle indoctrination is widely acknowledged as predatory, an element which is often understated in such conversions or the attempts of such conversion is the role of loyalty and trust which might develop between the perpetrator and the victim. Fiduciary relationships are often abused to affect such religious conversion. For example, an educator transmitting religious doctrine of a competing faith to a Hindu student. The Hindu student is likely to accept what the teacher is transmitting owing to existence of the fiduciary relationship. The exploitation of the fiduciary relationship to religiously indoctrinate victims would also be included in this category. Since the underlying animosity towards the victim’s faith forms the basis of predatory proselytization, such cases are considered religiously motivated hate crimes. This case was included in the Hinduphobia Tracker because it involved a calculated effort to persuade a Hindu woman to abandon her faith and adopt Christianity through financial inducements and psychological manipulation. The conduct targeted her religious identity and sought to influence her conversion through material benefits rather than personal spiritual conviction. The religious motivation was evident from the nature of the inducements described in the complaint. The benefits were linked to accepting Christianity and abandoning Hindu beliefs and practices. This went beyond the expression of Christian belief and involved using material incentives to encourage a Hindu woman to leave her ancestral faith. The objective was religious conversion, not unconditional charity or social welfare. Furthermore, using financial inducements to influence religious choices exploited the victim’s circumstances to influence a deeply personal decision. By linking material benefits to conversion, the accused sought to create an incentive for the victim to abandon Hinduism and adopt another religion. The fact that the efforts targeted a Hindu woman demonstrated that her religious identity was central to the conversion attempt. The conduct also reflected a broader religious objective of reducing adherence to Hinduism and increasing adherence to Christianity. The intended outcome was not religious coexistence or mutual understanding, but the replacement of one religious identity with another. By encouraging the victim to leave her faith in return for promised benefits, those involved treated her Hindu religious identity as something to be discarded and replaced. The objective depended on the abandonment of Hindu beliefs and practices, demonstrating a deliberate religious motive. More importantly, the victim was also physically and mentally exploited, and her freedom to return to her family was restricted. This revealed that the effort to influence her religious identity was accompanied by direct harm to her physical and mental well-being and interference with her personal liberty. The combination of conversion inducements, psychological manipulation and physical and mental torture made this a serious instance of targeted religious coercion against a Hindu woman. Thus, it was added to the Hinduphobia Tracker as a hate crime. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records the incident date based on when the victim’s ordeal began rather than when the incident was reported by the media. The available sources did not specify the exact date the incident began. Therefore, 19 October 2026, when it was reported in the media, has been selected as the indicative incident date for documentation purposes only. The victim belonged to the Yadav community, which is classified as Other Backwards Classes (OBC) in some contexts, though classification may vary by state and circumstances. Because the victim’s specific caste category was not established, the Tracker recorded it as Unknown.
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
Christian Extremists
Perpetrators Range
From 2 To 5
Perpetrators Gender
both
Sources 
