Hindu family in Jaunpur targeted: daughter’s sacred mangalsutra snatched amid forced Christian conversion attempts

Case ID : 5954bc0 | Location : Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Mon, 2 September, 2024

Case ID : 5954bc0

Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh, India

2 September, 2024

Hindu family in Jaunpur targeted: daughter’s sacred mangalsutra snatched amid forced Christian conversion attempts

Predatory Proselytisation

Harassment, threats, coercion for conversion

Attempting to convert/converting by denigrating Hinduism

Case Summary

In Jaunpur, a Hindu woman named Meena Devi and her husband Amardev Ram were forced to convert to Christianity by Christians in their neighbourhood. When they refused, they were beaten up. The mangalsutra of their daughter was snatched. The Police reached the spot and investigated the case, and the accused had absconded from their homes. According to the victims, Christian men named Amarnath and Samarnath of the village regularly conducted prayers for Jesus on Sundays in the church built in their house. Many people of the village were lured and converted to Christianity. Amarnath, Samarnath, Ravinder, Pankaj, Manjay, Rohit, Anshu, Shivam, Bablu, Jiyut, Khiladi, Amit, Subhash and Mewalal called Meena to the church to convert her to Christianity. When she protested, they entered her house in groups and beat her family up. They snatched her daughter Pooja's Mangalsutra. Meena's husband Amardev was brutally beaten. Police registered a case against 14 accused Christians.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category- Predatory Proselytisation. The sub-category relevant in this case is - Harassment, threats, 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 on discriminatory grounds which has the effect of nullifying a person’s rights or infringing upon his freedom to exercise his right 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 cases documented, 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 other sub-category selected is - Attempting to convert/converting by denigrating Hinduism. In several cases, Hindus are converted or an attempt is made to convert Hindus by denigrating their faith, Hinduism. In such cases, the Hindus associate with the non-Hindu perpetrators often by choice and then, the attempt to convert them by insulting their faith, showing the faith down etc begins. An example of this would be a non-Hindu gathering where the Hindus are attending the gathering of their own free will. However, once they attend the gathering, there is an explicit attempt to convert them by abusing their faith and hailing the faith of the perpetrator. The denigration of the Hindu faith is often based on misrepresentation of the Hindu faith, its doctrine and scriptures and insult to espoused traditions if not blatant lies about Hindu beliefs and ways. Such conversions or attempts at conversions are driven by animosity towards the Hindu faith and are therefore documented as religiously motivated hate crimes. This case constitutes a hate crime because the harassment, threats, and coercion experienced by Meena Devi and her family are explicitly rooted in their Hindu religious identity. The repeated attempts by Christian men to forcibly convert them demonstrate an intent to undermine their freedom to practice their religion. The physical violence inflicted—beating the family and forcibly snatching the daughter’s mangalsutra, a sacred Hindu symbol—reflects a pattern of intimidation aimed at coercing conversion through fear and suffering. Such behaviour not only humiliates and demeans the victims but also infringes on their fundamental rights to religious freedom. The targeted nature of this harassment, based solely on their Hindu faith, reveals a discriminatory motive that defines this as a religiously motivated hate crime. The forcible snatching of the daughter’s mangalsutra in this case is a direct attack on a deeply significant Hindu religious and cultural symbol. The mangalsutra is not merely an ornament but embodies the sacred bond of marriage and the wearer’s Hindu identity. By violently removing it, the perpetrators sought to symbolically sever the victim’s connection to her faith and marital tradition. This act serves as a deliberate denigration of Hinduism and its customs, intended to humiliate and degrade the victim and coerce her and her family into abandoning their religion. Such desecration of religious symbols is a tactic used in forced conversions to undermine the dignity and identity of Hindus, reinforcing the animosity behind the act and qualifying it as a religiously motivated hate crime.