Muslim man pretends to be Hindu and marries Hindu woman according to Hindu customs, starts forcing the victim to convert when his identity is revealed

Case ID : a037860 | Location : Sitarganj, Uttarakhand, India | Date of Incident : Sun, 3 November, 2024

Case ID : a037860

Sitarganj, Uttarakhand, India

3 November, 2024

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Marries as per Hindu rituals

Blackmailed to convert

Case Summary

On November 4, 2024, a young woman from Sitarganj accused a Muslim youth of cheating and forcing her to convert to Islam. The woman, who had been working in Gurgaon, Haryana, met a man named Sanjay Yadav in 2022, who proposed marriage due to her well-behaved nature. They married according to Hindu customs and lived together for two years. However, on October 27, 2024, the woman discovered her husband's Aadhar card, revealing his real name as Mushtaq Ahmed, and he confessed to being Muslim, insisting she convert to Islam if she wished to remain with him. She accused him of trapping her under love jihad and has filed a complaint with the SSP, urging action. The police started investigating the case based on the victim's complaint.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been documented as a religious hate crime because the details clearly show that the offender had a bias against the Hindu faith and that the offence was performed in conjunction with that bias. Based on the case details, it has been added under one prime category of the tracker, which is- Hate crimes against women in relationships and sexual crimes. Under this, two sub-categories have been chosen. The first is- Man pretends to be Hindu, within which there tertiary categories- 'Name changed' and 'Marries as per Hindu rituals' have also been selected, based on the case details. 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 prime category which has been selected here is- Blackmailed to convert. When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman is blackmailed to convert her religion, owing to her religious identity of being a Hindu. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim, however, there could be cases where the relationship is not consensual and the non-Hindu man starts blackmailing a Hindu woman to convert her religion. In these cases, it is often seen that the Hindu woman is blackmailed with intimate photos and/or videos, threats of harm to her or her family, threats of violence etc. Such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim and are therefore qualified as hate crimes. Here, the accused reportedly concealed his Muslim identity and introduced himself with a Hindu name, "Sanjay Yadav." 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. The accused, in this case, then proceeded to marry the woman according to Hindu customs. His deception indicates a calculated approach to gain her trust and later influence her religious beliefs, thus targeting her based on her Hindu identity. Thereafter, once the accused's real identity was revealed before the victim, he coerced her to convert to Islam, threatening that she would only be allowed to stay with him if she accepted his faith. This demand, combined with the pressure exerted by his family, represents a form of manipulation and coercion targeting her religious beliefs and identity. Since every detail points towards the fact that the perpetrator wanted to target the victim because of her religious identity specifically and that his motivation was driven by religious hate, this case has been documented in the hate tracker.