Minor Hindu girl harassed and threatened by Muslim youth; pressured into relationship, religious conversion, and marriage

Case ID : 99586dc | Location : Barwani, Madhya Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Mon, 15 September, 2025

Case ID : 99586dc

Barwani, Madhya Pradesh, India

15 September, 2025

Minor Hindu girl harassed and threatened by Muslim youth; pressured into relationship, religious conversion, and marriage

Predatory Proselytisation

Harassment, threats, coercion for conversion

Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination

Conversion of minor

Case Summary

In Palsud town of Barwani district, Madhya Pradesh, a 15-year-old Hindu girl studying in class 10 was harassed, threatened, and pressured for religious conversion by a Muslim youth named Faizan and his associates. According to the victim, Faizan had been harassing her for a long time and was persistently pressuring her to enter into a relationship with him. Another Muslim girl named Alia repeatedly called her late at night, urging her to speak to Faizan and enter into a romantic relationship with him. Faizan and his associates, including Amin, Aavesh, Shoaib, Shamsu, and Ramzan, followed her, intimidated her, and threatened her with abduction and murder when she resisted. Furthermore, she was also pressured for religious conversion and marriage by the accused and his friends. On September 12, 2025, the victim received several phone calls where a girl was pressuring her to speak to Faizan. Fed up with the ordeal, the victim confided in her father, and together they filed a complaint with the police. However, the police did not act, while Faizan's family attempted to coerce the victim's father into a compromise. On September 13, 2025, two Muslim men named Shoaib and Shamshu also pressured her to compromise and threatened her if she did not do so. This failure to take action provoked anger in the Hindu community, which led to a protest by the members of a Hindu organisation outside the police station. Subsequently, the police registered an FIR against nine accused under the Madhya Pradesh Religious Freedom Act 2020, the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, and various sections of the Indian Penal Code. Barwani Additional Superintendent of Police Dheeraj Babbar confirmed that four of the accused — Faizan, Shoaib, Shamsu, and Ramzan — were arrested, while search operations were underway to apprehend the remaining accused.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category of - Predatory Proselytisaton. Within it, the sub-category selected 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 relevant here is - Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination, with the tertiary category being - Conversion of minor. 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 grooming or 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 grooming or 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 indoctrinate 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. This case has been added to the tracker because a minor Hindu girl was subjected to sustained harassment and threats for having a relationship with the Muslim accused. She was also pressured for religious conversion and marriage by the accused. This sustained pattern of coercion underscores that the crime was not a random or isolated incident but a deliberate effort to impose religious conversion through intimidation and forced marriage. Such actions violate the victim’s fundamental rights, including her religious freedom and autonomy to choose her faith. Furthermore, the targeting of a minor Hindu girl with the specific aim of having a relationship with her, despite her refusal, converting her religion and marrying her, indicates the offence was motivated by hostility towards her religion. This intent to alter her faith under duress and persistent harassment demonstrates that this was a clear case of a religiously motivated hate crime. When the victim resisted these demands, she was given abduction and death threats by the accused and his friends. In such cases, threats or harassment serve a dual purpose: physical subjugation and religious humiliation. The intention is to break the victim down emotionally, physically, and spiritually to make her comply. This was not random; it is systematic, targeted, and rooted in religious animosity. It is further important to note here that the victim was a minor, which means the element of consent and genuine change of conscience was missing ab initio. Minors, due to their young age and lack of maturity, are particularly vulnerable to manipulation and coercion. They may not have the ability to fully understand the implications of converting to another religion or having a relationship, and the Muslim perpetrator purposely targeted and exploited this vulnerability of the victim. Furthermore, any supposed consent given by the minor is already considered invalid under the POCSO Act. Since this case exemplifies the use of coercion and manipulation to achieve religious conversion, it is a blatant act of religious hate, which is why it has been documented here in the hate tracker. Such acts are not merely criminal in nature; they are ideologically charged, revealing religious prejudice and a calculated intent to alter the religious identity of a minor without her volition. Such actions stem from inherent hostility towards the victim's professed faith, since Abrahamic faiths believe that any non-adherent to the faith is subject to being dehumanised until they convert. Therefore, religious conversions, even of minors, are often seen as a badge of honour, totally disregarding the methods used to achieve it. Since such predatory actions stem from doctrinal animosity towards the Hindu faith and its adherents, this case is being documented as a religiously motivated hate crime. 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, although it is reported that she received calls on September 12, 2025, during which a girl pressured her to speak to Faizan. To document this case, an indicative date—September 12, 2025—has been used as a placeholder to represent the start of her suffering. While media coverage of the incident emerged on 14 September 2025, the Hinduphobia Tracker records the incident based on when the victim’s ordeal began, not when it was reported.