Hindu man lured to Italy on job promise, held hostage and pressured to eat cow meat and convert to Islam

Case ID : 30ab1b7 | Location : Italy | Date of Incident : Fri, 29 August, 2025

Case ID : 30ab1b7

Italy

29 August, 2025

Hindu man lured to Italy on job promise, held hostage and pressured to eat cow meat and convert to Islam

Predatory Proselytisation

Harassment, threats, coercion for conversion

Case Summary

In Italy, Govind Singh, a resident of Losal in Rajasthan’s Sikar district, was held hostage after being lured abroad on the promise of a well-paid job. According to his wife, Bhavna Kanwar, he was left with a group of Muslim men of African origin, asylum seekers, who harassed and pressured him to eat beef and convert his religion. He was also denied the promised employment and salary. On 29 October 2026, Bhavna approached the Superintendent of Police (SP) in Sikar and appealed for her husband’s safe return to India and action against those who had sent him abroad. Bhavna said a family from their village arranged Govind’s travel to Italy by promising him a job at a reputed furniture company. Omsingh, who lived in Italy, was known to the family, while his father, Roop Singh, and elder brother, Hoshiyar Singh, frequently visited their home. They had also accepted Bhavna as their Dharam ki Beti (religious daughter). In 2024, Roop Singh and Hoshiyar Singh persuaded Govind to take up the promised job in Italy, offering him a monthly salary of ₹2.5 lakh. They assured the family that they would gradually deduct the initial expenses from his salary and arrange a permanent visa and other documents within three months. To arrange the job and travel, Govind’s family paid a total of ₹6 lakh. In 2024, his father handed over ₹4 lakh in cash to Roop Singh. Subsequently, in August 2025, he paid another ₹2 lakh to Lalita Kanwar, Omsingh’s wife. After receiving the money and completing the documentation process, the people involved arranged for Govind to travel to Italy. He reached Italy on 3 June 2026. However, after his arrival, Govind was not sent to the promised furniture company or provided with the promised work. Instead, he was left with people of African origin who were Muslims, in an area where cows were slaughtered and consumed. Bhavna stated that her husband was harassed and pressured to eat beef and convert his religion. He was not paid any salary despite the employment arrangement. She further stated that Omsingh withheld Govind’s salary for three months, amounting to ₹2.5 lakh. When the family realised that Govind had been cheated, they approached the accused persons at their residence and demanded the return of the ₹6 lakh paid for the job arrangement. Instead of returning the money, the accused refused and threatened the family with death. Bhavna stated that the family had submitted a written complaint about the incident at Losal Police Station. However, she said the police took no effective action and did not provide a satisfactory response. Consequently, on 29 October 2026, she approached the Sikar SP’s office and appealed for her husband to be brought back safely from Italy and for action to be taken against those responsible.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category selected for this case is: Predatory proselytisation. The subcategory selected is: Harassment, threat, coercion for conversion. Harassment covers a wide range of behaviours of an offensive nature. It is commonly understood as behaviour that demeans, humiliates, and intimidates a person, including threats and coercion. Harassment and threats, in this case, find their root in discriminatory grounds, which have the effect of nullifying a person’s rights or infringing upon his freedom to exercise his rights specifically owing to the victim’s religious identity. Verbal and physical threats and psychological or physical harassment are often used against Hindu victims because they choose to practice their professed religion. Religious harassment also includes forced and involuntary conversions by harassment, threats or coercion. Coercion includes intimidatory tactics like force-feeding a Hindu victim beef to convert to another religion, forceful circumcision, etc. In several documented cases, non-Hindu perpetrators or those who harbour specific animosity towards Hinduism harass victims simply based on their religious identity. Such cases often also include harassment to ensure the Hindu victim abandons his/her professed religion and adopts the religion of the perpetrator. Such cases where Hindu victims are harassed to convert to the perpetrator’s religion are rooted in animosity towards the victim’s religious identity and are therefore documented as religiously motivated hate crimes. The hate crime aspect in this case stemmed from the reported use of religious pressure and intimidation to make a Hindu man abandon his faith. Govind Singh’s wife, Bhavna Kanwar, stated that he was harassed in Italy and pressured to consume beef and convert to another religion. These demands targeted two distinct but closely connected aspects of his Hindu identity: his religious beliefs concerning the cow and his freedom to retain and practise his faith. The pressure to change his religious beliefs, combined with the demand to violate a religious dietary practice, made the harassment religious in nature. The cow holds a sacred position in Hindu religious and cultural traditions. It is widely revered as a symbol of nourishment, maternal care, generosity and life. This reverence is reflected in religious observances, customs and dietary choices followed by many Hindus. A significant number of Hindus abstain from eating beef because consuming the flesh of an animal they regard as sacred conflicts with their religious conscience. For them, this is not simply a matter of personal taste or food preference; it is connected to their understanding of faith, devotion and respect for the cow. Consequently, pressuring a Hindu to consume beef can amount to an attempt to make that person act against a deeply held religious belief. In this instance, the pressure to eat beef must be understood alongside the demand to convert. The two demands were not independent matters of food and personal belief. Together, they pressured Govind to disregard a religious practice associated with Hinduism and abandon the religion to which he belonged. When a person is intimidated into violating a religious dietary belief as part of an effort to change their faith, food becomes an instrument of religious coercion. The significance lies in the attempt to make the person compromise their religious conscience rather than allowing them to follow their beliefs freely. The pressure to convert directly interfered with Govind’s freedom of religion. Hindu identity encompasses more than a person's formal religious affiliation; it can include devotion to Hindu deities, participation in worship, observance of religious customs, festivals, traditions and personal beliefs. Conversion to another religion involves a fundamental change in one's religious affiliation and beliefs. Such a decision must come from personal conviction and free choice. Harassment, intimidation or pressure designed to make someone abandon Hinduism undermines that freedom and treats the person's existing faith as something they must surrender. The circumstances surrounding Govind’s stay in Italy further explain the vulnerability in which this religious pressure took place. He had travelled abroad on the promise of employment, but was not provided with the promised work or salary. His wife stated that his salary was withheld and that the family faced threats when they sought the return of the money paid to arrange his employment. Being stranded in a foreign country without the promised livelihood placed him in a precarious position. In such circumstances, pressure to consume beef and change religion carries particular significance because it targets a person whose ability to protect himself and exercise his choices is already compromised. Such acts are carried out by Muslim perpetrators due to indoctrination by Islamic theology, which advocates that all non-Muslims (referred to as kafirs) are inferior and subject to subjugation unless they convert to Islam or live under Islamic rule (dhimmitude). These ideas are not mere abstractions; they manifest in actions where non-Muslims, especially Hindus in India, are seen as targets for religious domination, coercion, or humiliation. This theological framework fosters an "us versus them" mindset, in which any assertion of Hindu identity or religious freedom is seen not only as undesirable but as a threat to Islamic supremacy. As a result, perpetrators who are shaped by such teachings feel justified, even morally obligated, to harass, suppress, or violently attack Hindus, particularly when Hindus assert their religious rights or resist conversion. As a result, Muslim perpetrators invoke such doctrines to justify coercive attempts to convert non-Muslims, particularly Hindus, portraying conversion as a means of abandoning Kufr (a state of disbelief in Islam or disbelief in Islam) and attaining salvation. Such acts, therefore, are not isolated but driven by a broader ideological hostility towards Hindus as non-believers and reflect an attempt to impose religious dominance. Since this case was also not a random isolated incident of grooming of a minor but a premeditated attack motivated by bias and hatred against the Hindu community, which is a defining feature of hate crimes, this has been added to the tracker. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incidents based on the date the victim’s ordeal began, rather than the date they were subsequently reported in the media. In this case, the report states that the second payment of ₹2 lakh was made in August 2025 but does not specify the exact date. Therefore, we recorded 30th August 2025 as the indicative incident date for documentation purposes.