Minor Hindu girl lured through fake Hindu identity, abducted, sexually assaulted and pressured to convert to Islam
Baraut, Uttar Pradesh, India 
9 October, 2026
Case Summary
In Baraut, Baghpat, Uttar Pradesh, a 15-year-old Hindu girl was lured into a relationship by Sameer, a Muslim man who created a fake social media identity under the name Aman Malik and posed as a Hindu to gain her trust. He abducted her and subjected her to sexual assault in Haryana, where he also pressured her to convert to Islam and abandon Hinduism. Sameer, son of Khursheed, was originally a Delhi resident and frequently visited his aunt's residence in Nai Basti, Baraut. During one such visit, he came into contact with the minor girl and used his fake social media identity to gain her trust and develop a relationship with her. On 10 October 2026, he lured the girl away and took her with him to Haryana, where he sexually assaulted her and pressured her to convert to Islam. Following the incident, the girl's family approached the police, while Hindu organisations demanded her immediate recovery. Swami Yashveer Maharaj also warned that a sit-in protest would be staged outside the accused's residence if the girl was not traced and recovered promptly. The Baraut police registered a case and launched an investigation, forming four teams to trace the missing girl. The police subsequently recovered the minor girl, following which she underwent a medical examination and her statement was recorded before the court. After the girl's recovery, Sameer remained absconding and continued to evade arrest. He also threatened to kill the girl's father. Noting the seriousness of the case, Superintendent of Police Purnendu Singh announced a reward of ₹10,000 for information leading to his arrest. Police teams continued efforts to trace and apprehend him as part of a special drive against wanted and reward-listed criminals. On the night of 1 November 2026, Sameer was spotted moving near Kanshi Ram Colony in Baraut. Acting under the direction of Superintendent of Police Purnendu Singh, a Baraut police team attempted to intercept him. However, he opened fire at the police, prompting retaliatory fire in which he sustained a gunshot wound to his leg. Police subsequently apprehended him and took him to hospital for treatment. The police recovered a country-made pistol, ammunition and an empty cartridge case from his possession. Circle Officer (CO) Baraut Anshu Jain confirmed the arrest and stated that further legal proceedings had been initiated. After receiving medical treatment, Sameer was produced before the court and remanded to judicial custody. His aunt had also been arrested earlier in connection with the case.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category: Predatory Proselytisation. Within it, the sub-category selected here is: Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination, with the tertiary categories being: Family claims grooming, Rape and sexual assault/harassment and Conversion of minor. 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. The other primary category selected is: Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. Within it, the sub-category selected is: Man pretends to be Hindu, with the tertiary category being: Name changed. 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 malafide 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 sub-category selected here is: Brainwashed and/or groomed, with the tertiary categories being: Family claims grooming, Rape and sexual assault/harassment and Conversion of minor. 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 serves as a clear illustration of a religiously motivated hate crime, as a minor Hindu girl was targeted by a Muslim man who deliberately falsified his religious identity to pose as a Hindu. Following this initial deception, the victim was abducted, sexually assaulted and pressured to convert to Islam. Each element of this incident, from the initial fraudulent approach to the subsequent coercion, demonstrates a premeditated effort to target the victim specifically because of her religious background. Firstly, the accused deliberately concealed his religious identity to initiate and sustain a relationship with a Hindu girl. This itself is a clear manifestation of bias and malicious intent towards the victim's religion. By concealing his true identity, he exploited her trust, targeting her under false pretences. This indicates a premeditated intent to manipulate her based on her religious background. In cases like these, the tactic of adopting a false Hindu identity to manipulate and "ensnare" a Hindu individual is not just an act of personal betrayal but can also be interpreted as an expression of disdain or disregard for Hinduism and its customs, reflecting a deeper animosity towards Hindus and their beliefs. Secondly, it is further important to note here that when the accused trapped the victim, she was just a minor, which means the element of consent and genuine change of conscience was missing ab initio. Minors, due to their young age and lack of maturity, are particularly vulnerable to manipulation and coercion. They may not have the ability to fully understand the implications of consenting to a relationship or converting to another religion, and the Muslim perpetrator purposely targeted and exploited this vulnerability of the victim. Since this case exemplifies the use of coercion and manipulation to achieve a deceptive relationship and later religious conversion, it is a blatant act of religious hate. The targeting of the victim while she was still a minor is significant because it reveals an effort to shape her choices before she had attained full maturity and independence. In this context, the early grooming, the concealment of religious identity, and the later pressure to abandon her Hindu faith form part of a single continuum of coercion. The concern is not merely that a relationship began at a young age, but that trust was cultivated to facilitate a marriage that the victim would not have entered into with full knowledge of the accused's identity, and was then followed by efforts to compel religious conversion. Taken together, these elements demonstrate that the conduct was directed at undermining the religious autonomy of a Hindu woman and breaking her resistance to conversion, rather than a purely personal or incidental dispute. Moreover, the perpetrator abducted the girl, after which he pressured her to convert to Islam, which further intensified the religious motive. Pressuring a Hindu individual to discard her religious faith and embrace another was a direct attack on her religious identity and dignity. It was not a matter of personal choice; it was coercion rooted in hostility towards the victim's Hindu identity. Such an attempt reflects religious animosity because the act was not simply about personal differences but about erasing the victim’s Hindu faith, making it a religiously motivated crime. Such actions stem from inherent hostility towards the victim's professed faith since Abrahamic faiths believe that any non-adherent to the faith is subject to being dehumanised till they convert. Such acts were not merely personal crimes; they were rooted in a desire to dominate and erase the religious identity of the victim. Since such predatory actions stem from doctrinal animosity towards the Hindu faith and its adherents, this case is being documented as a religiously motivated hate crime. Disclaimer: The Hinduphobia Tracker records incidents based on when an event occurred or when the victim's ordeal began. It is important to clarify that none of the media sources covering this case has specified the exact date when the incident occurred. Therefore, for documentation purposes, we have recorded the date based on the earliest mentioned date, when the minor girl was abducted by the Muslim man, 10 October 2026.
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 1
- Adult 0
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 0
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
