Muslim minor boy along with his father brainwashes his Hindu classmate to convert to Islam in Karnataka

Case ID : 456fab2 | Location : Chitradurga, Karnataka, India | Date of Incident : Sat, 28 October, 2023

Case ID : 456fab2

Chitradurga, Karnataka, India

28 October, 2023

Muslim minor boy along with his father brainwashes his Hindu classmate to convert to Islam in Karnataka

Predatory Proselytisation

Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination

Conversion of minor

Case Summary

In Chitradurga district, Karnataka, a father-son duo, where the son was a minor, was booked for brainwashing a Hindu minor boy from the Kuruba community into converting to Islam, marking the first instance of a minor being charged under the Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Act 2022. The complaint was filed by the victim’s father, stating his son's sudden change in behaviour and discovery of Islam-related literature and a skullcap in his possession. In his complaint, the 17-year-old Hindu victim’s father stated that he grew suspicious of the attitude of his son when he stopped doing pooja and worshipping Hindu deities. The complainant added that his son recently declined to participate in the Dasara (Dussehra) festivities. Additionally, drug-related chats were found on the boy's phone. The case against the accused father-son duo has been lodged under Section 5 of the 2022 Act (prohibition of conversion from one religion to another by misrepresentation, force, fraud, undue influence, coercion, allurement, or marriage promise).

Why it is Hate Crime ?

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 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 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 indoctrinated 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. In this specific case, it is evident from the details that the Hindu victim was a minor which essentially means that the element of consent and genuine change of conscience was missing ab initio. We have classified it as a religiously motivated hate crime under the core category of Predatory Proselytisation because there is a distinct component in this case, which essentially involves brainwashing a non-Muslim to abandon his faith and begin practising the alien faith. This demonstrates the perpetrator's bias against the Hindu faith and their deliberate attempt to alienate the victim from his Hindu identity. In this case, the father of the victim testified that his son was brainwashed and indoctrinated to adopt Islam. The accused were successful in brainwashing the minor boy to the extent that he stopped practising his professed faith and instead began performing Islamic practices. Since the motivating factor of the crime was the religious identity of the victim and the intention of the accused to disenfranchise him from it, the case has been categorised as a hate crime.