Hindu woman physically assaulted and coerced to convert to Islam by her husband

Case ID : 8da1957 | Location : Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Tue, 31 January, 2023

Case ID : 8da1957

Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, India

31 January, 2023

Hindu woman physically assaulted and coerced to convert to Islam by her husband

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Forced conversion after marriage

Case Summary

In the Tikar village of Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, identified as Gauri alias Babita was subjected to sustained dowry harassment and coercion for religious conversion by her husband and a Muslim woman. According to the complaint filed by the victim, she got married to a man named Arvind Shukla on 1 February 2023 as per Hindu customs. During that time, her family had given ₹10 lakh in cash, a gold chain, a gold ring and a Hero Splendor motorcycle as per their capacity as dowry. However, immediately after marriage, her husband, father-in-law Jagdish Narayan Shukla, brothers-in-law Manoj Kumar Shukla and Satish Shukla, sister-in-law Alka Shukla and the brother-in-law’s son, Manas Shukla, began taunting her for insufficient dowry. They all began harassing her and physically assaulted her, demanding five lakh rupees in cash and a car. When she refused, they brutally assaulted her and threw her out of the marital home, forcing her to take shelter with her parents. The victim also stated that during this period, her husband was having an affair with a Muslim woman named Khushboo Nisha and was pressuring her to convert to Islam. After enduring this situation for months, she approached the Gagaha police station and lodged a formal complaint. Police subsequently registered a case against all six accused individuals under IPC sections 85 and 115(2), along with sections 3 and 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act and initiated an investigation into the incident.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category of: - Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. Within it, the sub-category selected is - Forced conversion after marriage. In such cases, a non-Hindu man marries a Hindu woman, and the force/pressure to convert to Islam begins after marriage. In such cases, typically, two patterns emerge. First, when the relationship is consensual, and the religious identity of the perpetrator is known to the Hindu woman in the relationship. The marriage could be under the Special Marriages Act, where neither parties are required to convert their religion for the marriage to be considered legitimate. While the victim in such cases enters matrimony assuming that religious identity is not a barrier, the non-Hindu man starts to pressure the woman to convert to Islam after marriage. The second is when the woman gets into a marriage with the man pretending to share her faith. Later, when the truth is revealed, the man starts pressuring the woman to convert her religion and give up her religious identity. This case has been added to the tracker because a Hindu woman was harassed for dowry, physically assaulted, and pressured for religious conversion by her husband, who was involved in an affair with the Muslim woman, Khushboo Nisha. At the time of writing this report, there is no official record confirming whether the husband had formally converted to Islam. However, the pressure for conversion by the husband stemmed directly from the influence of the Muslim woman with whom he was in a relationship. His behaviour clearly reflects someone who had already mentally crossed over to the Islamic fold, was driven by religious motives, and exhibited complete disregard for the religious identity of his wife. The victim was harassed, physically assaulted, and thrown out of the house by her husband and his family members. Often in such cases, the violence serves a dual purpose of physical subjugation and religious humiliation. The intention was to break the victim down emotionally, physically, and spiritually so that she could be converted. While she was tortured by everyone in the family, her husband’s actions stood apart since his violence was rooted not only in dowry harassment but also in religious animosity aimed at converting her to Islam. This shows that the husband was willing to go to any extent, including violence, to achieve the goal of religious conversion. Even without formal documentation of his conversion, his actions clearly show that he had accepted the ideological mindset of religious supremacism. His conduct was not merely personal misconduct but pointed to a broader, ideologically driven effort, influenced by the Muslim woman, to dismantle the Hindu identity of his wife. Furthermore, pressuring a Hindu individual to discard her religious faith and embrace another is 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 is 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 considered inferior and subject to being dehumanised until they convert. This was not just a case of domestic abuse or marital dispute. It was a systematic attempt to erase the religious identity of a Hindu woman through coercion and physical violence. Since the accused’s actions were rooted in religious animosity, this case has been added to the tracker. Disclaimer - It is important to clarify that none of the media sources covering this case have specified the exact date when the victim's ordeal began, though it is mentioned that she got married on 1 February 2023. Thus, to document this case, we have used an indicative date—1 February 2023—as a placeholder to represent the beginning of her suffering. While media coverage of the incident emerged on 18 November 2025, the Hinduphobia Tracker records the incident based on when the victim’s ordeal began, not when it was reported. Disclaimer - The victim’s husband was having an affair with the Muslim woman while simultaneously pressuring his Hindu wife to convert to Islam. His conduct throughout the incident demonstrated clear religious hostility. Based on these actions, it is a reasonable and logical conclusion that he had already embraced Islam. Therefore, for documentation purposes within the Hinduphobia Tracker, the perpetrator’s religious identity has been recorded as Muslim extremists. Disclaimer: Although the police registered a case against six individuals, the perpetrator count has been recorded as two. This is because only the victim’s husband acted with clear religious animosity, influenced and emboldened by the Muslim woman involved. While the other family members also harassed the victim, their actions appear to have been driven primarily by greed for dowry, not by religious motives.