Hindu girl student raped, abused, and pressured to convert by Muslim man pretending to be Hindu

Case ID : 90a0700 | Location : Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Sat, 1 February, 2025

Case ID : 90a0700

Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India

1 February, 2025

Hindu girl student raped, abused, and pressured to convert by Muslim man pretending to be Hindu

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Assault or threat upon refusal to convert

Forced conversion before marriage

Case Summary

A young Hindu woman from Surguja, Chhattisgarh, studying in Kakadev, Kanpur, was sexually exploited and manipulated by a man named Zubair Ahmed, who had initially introduced himself as a Hindu named Suraj. The two met two years ago, and Zubair trapped her under the guise of love, promising to marry her. After gaining her trust, Zubair raped the girl and began pressuring her to convert to Islam. When the girl confronted him about marriage, Zubair became abusive and violent, physically assaulting her. One day, she discovered his true identity when she visited his house and learned that Suraj was actually Zubair Ahmed. Despite their religious differences, Zubair pushed her to change her religion, and when she refused, he threatened her life. Seeking help, the victim went to Zubair's elder brother, Fuzel Ahmed, to lodge a complaint. However, Fuzel also molested her, tried to pull her into a room, and treated her disrespectfully. When she protested, he forcefully pushed her out of the house. Distressed by the continuous abuse, the victim reported the incident to the Bajaria police. Following her complaint, the police registered a case against Zubair and Fuzel under serious charges, including sexual harassment, coercion for religious conversion, and assault.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the prime category of- Hate crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. Under this, the first sub-category selected is- Man pretends to be Hindu, within which, the tertiary category selected 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. The second sub-category selected is- Forced conversion before marriage. In such cases, a non-Hindu man is in a relationship with a Hindu woman when the pressure to convert her religion begins to manifest. The relationship in such cases is mostly consensual and the religious identity of the perpetrator is known to the Hindu woman in the relationship, however, at some point during the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts to force the victim to convert her religion and give up her Hindu religious identity. In such cases, the methods used to force the victim to convert her religion often revolve around force-feeding beef, forcing her to wear hijab, forcing her to read the Kalma or even pressurizing the victim to do ‘Nikah’, which is marriage under Islamic law, with a prerequisite being conversion to Islam. Cases where a Hindu woman consensually converts to Islam in a relationship will be left out of the hate crime database, even though it could be argued in several cases that the conversion was a result of religious brainwashing. The third sub-category selected is- Assault or threat upon refusal to convert. When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman faces threats or assault after she refuses to convert and change her religious identity owing to pressure/force by the non-Hindu man. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim. Somewhere along the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts pressurizing the Hindu woman to convert to Islam and upon her refusal, assaults or threatens the victim. Such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim and are therefore qualified as hate crimes. Cases where the Hindu woman converts to Islam and does not file a complaint about the force or threat, are not considered a part of the hate tracker, even though, it may be argued that the woman was brainwashed or threatened to convert to Islam. The religious motive of the crime is evident from the fact that the Muslim perpetrator hid his true identity to trap the Hindu victim. 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 that reflects a deeper animosity towards Hindus and their beliefs. Further, the religious angle of the crime became more apparent when the Muslim man continued to take advantage of her physically under the guise of marriage. Thereafter, he started pressuring her to convert to Islam. Here, the accused followed a pattern wherein he first religiously profiled the victim and then deceived her by pretending to share her faith, then physically exploited her under the false pretext of marriage, and later revealed his true intent by coercing her to convert to Islam. This targeted attack is a direct expression of hate and intolerance towards the victim's religion, hence this case has been classified as a religious hate crime.