Hindu woman deceived by Muslim man pretending to be Hindu, abducted and raped after real identity disclosed

Case ID : 3234506 | Location : Damoh, Madhya Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Sat, 8 October, 2022

Case ID : 3234506

Damoh, Madhya Pradesh, India

8 October, 2022

Hindu woman deceived by Muslim man pretending to be Hindu, abducted and raped after real identity disclosed

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Brainwashed and/or groomed

Rape and sexual assault/harassment

Case Summary

In Damoh, Madhya Pradesh, a Muslim man named Ayan Khan deceived a Hindu girl for three years by posing as a Hindu. When the girl discovered his true identity, she ended the relationship. Enraged, Ayan kidnapped her, took her to Bhopal, and raped her repeatedly over several days. The incident has now been registered by the police. On 29 September 2025, a Dalit Hindu girl went missing from Damoh. Her family reported the disappearance to the police, and after ten days, she was found in Bhopal. When the police brought her back, she revealed that Ayan Khan had trapped her in a relationship under a false Hindu identity for three years. She had stopped speaking to him after learning the truth, but he later arrived at her home, called her outside on the pretext of talking, and abducted her in his car. Her family, unable to find her, lodged a missing person report and named Ayan as the suspect. When police checked, Ayan too was missing from his home. With help from the cyber cell, police traced and rescued the girl from Bhopal. The girl stated that Ayan had locked her in a room for a week, threatened her, and raped her several times. Although Ayan managed to flee, the girl was safely returned to her family. She gave a detailed statement at the Kotwali police station, after which the police filed charges of kidnapping, rape, and offences under the SC-ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. Later that night, members of Hindu organisations gathered at the police station demanding strict action against Ayan, calling it a case of religious deception. The victim’s mother also appealed for justice. Police confirmed that a case had been registered and an investigation was ongoing.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category in this case is: Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. The subcategory under this is: Man pretends to be Hindu. The tertiary category under this is: 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. Another subcategory under this is: Brainwashed and/or groomed. The tertiary category under this is: Rape and sexual assault/harassment. 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 has been added to the Hinduphobia Tracker because it exemplifies a pattern of targeted religiously motivated abuse against a Hindu woman. The crimes committed by Ayan Khan were not merely personal or interpersonal in nature; they were structured around the woman’s Hindu identity. By presenting himself as a Hindu, Ayan deliberately induced the victim to enter into a relationship under false pretences, establishing a foundation of deception designed to exploit her religious identity. This was not incidental or coincidental—it reflects a calculated plan to manipulate, dominate, and coerce a Hindu woman for religiously motivated objectives. The initial phase of the crime involved sustained deception, where Ayan masked his Muslim identity, gaining the victim’s trust and cultivating a relationship over three years. This long-term grooming ensured that the woman remained vulnerable to his influence and that her eventual discovery of his true religious identity would create a moment of conflict, precisely the point at which his coercion escalated. When the victim refused to continue the relationship upon learning his true identity, Ayan’s response was not only personal retaliation but explicitly religiously motivated aggression: he abducted her, transported her to Bhopal, and subjected her to repeated sexual assaults, threats, and confinement. The escalation from deception to abduction and sexual violence demonstrates a clear trajectory in which the victim’s Hindu identity was the central reason she was targeted. The case also falls within the subcategory of grooming or brainwashing with a religious angle. The prolonged nature of the relationship, beginning when the victim was already vulnerable due to age and social circumstances, shows deliberate exploitation. By luring the victim into a long-term relationship under false pretences, the perpetrators exploited her Hindu identity, establishing a foundation that allowed them to escalate coercion into abduction and sexual assault when their initial deceit was uncovered. Legally and socially, the acts committed qualify as hate crimes because they were motivated by the victim’s Hindu religious identity. The crimes cannot be understood solely as personal grievances, acts of lust, or interpersonal conflict; they were explicitly aimed at undermining and obliterating the victim’s religious adherence. The combination of deceit, sexual violence, threats, and coercion centered on forcing religious conversion makes this a clear example of targeted Hinduphobia. The inclusion of this case in the Tracker serves two functions. First, it ensures that incidents where Hindu women are deliberately targeted because of their religious identity are recorded, analysed, and made visible. Second, it highlights the mechanisms by which perpetrators use deception, grooming, abduction, and sexual violence, demonstrating a pattern of systemic targeting rather than isolated criminality. By documenting this case, the Tracker provides a record of religiously motivated crimes that cannot be classified merely as personal disputes, emphasising the intersection of gender-based violence and religious animosity in the persecution of Hindus. Disclaimer: It should be noted that none of the media reports on this case specify the exact date when the victim’s ordeal began. Based on her account, the harassment reportedly started approximately three years prior to the media report being published on 9 October 2025. Since the Hinduphobia Tracker records incidents according to when the ordeal began rather than when it was reported, we have treated the incident date as 9 October 2022 as a placeholder.