Hindu woman sexually harassed and threatened with abduction for refusing conversion and nikah

Case ID : aa4b043 | Location : Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Tue, 22 April, 2025

Case ID : aa4b043

Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India

22 April, 2025

Hindu woman sexually harassed and threatened with abduction for refusing conversion and nikah

Predatory Proselytisation

Harassment, threats, coercion for conversion

Case Summary

In Noida’s Phase 1 police station area of Uttar Pradesh, a Muslim businessman, Amin Kolu, pressured the daughter of a retired Colonel to accept Islam and marry him. When she refused, he threatened to abduct her to Kashmir. The woman reported that she is the daughter of a Colonel who participated in the 1971 war and was martyred in 1994. She does the business of candles. Kolu, originally from Chandpora Harwan in Kashmir, had come into contact with the woman’s family in March 2025 through business dealings. According to the woman, on 23 April 2025, Amin called her to the factory under the pretext of showing samples and holding a meeting. He told her that he had contacts in Saudi Arabia and would help her in internationalising her business. For that, he arranged a meeting in his office in Sector 6. There, he engaged in inappropriate behaviour and touched her inappropriately, prompting her to flee the scene. Also, she was verbally abused. Despite this, he continued to call and message her, insisting she return to the factory. He later asked her to convert and marry (nikah) him, and when she declined, he threatened to take her forcibly to Kashmir. Deputy Commissioner of Police, Rambadan Singh, confirmed that a case was registered based on the woman’s complaint. The accused was taken into custody, and further investigation was conducted.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case is categorised under the primary category- Predatory Proselytisation. Under that, the relevant sub-category 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. This case is a hate crime since a Hindu woman faced relentless pressure to convert to Islam and marry the man who was harassing her. When she stood her ground and refused, he threatened her with abduction, saying he would take her to Kashmir if she didn’t comply. What makes this even more disturbing is that the threats weren’t just words. During what was supposed to be a business meeting, he crossed the line and touched her inappropriately, completely disregarding her boundaries and autonomy. He also verbally abused her. This was not just about unwanted advances, it was about trying to break her spirit and force her to abandon her religious beliefs and submit to the perpetrator's conversion demands. Even after that, she was continuously targeted through a phone or messages. The psychological pressure she endured, combined with the physical violation, shows that the abuse was both personal and rooted in religious intolerance. Her refusal to convert only made the threats worse, making it clear that her faith was the reason she was being targeted. The use of religion as the basis for this abuse, seeking to compel her to abandon her faith under threat, classifies this incident as a religiously motivated hate crime and warrants inclusion in the Hinduphobia tracker.