Case Summary

Hindu tribal villagers in the Bilkisganj area of Sehore district, Madhya Pradesh, faced sustained disturbance to their religious life for over 3 months. On December 9, 2025, Hindu families from villages including Veerpur, Bhilpati and Khajuri reported that repeated night-time prayer meetings were being organised inside the villages, primarily at the residence of Rem Singh Barela. During these gatherings, Hindu villagers were encouraged to distance themselves from their ancestral faith and were offered inducements such as cash amounts reported to be up to ₹1 lakh, promises of employment and assurances that health, financial and family problems would be resolved through a change of religion. The activities largely targeted economically vulnerable Hindu tribal families and gradually created fear, mental pressure and social tension within the community. As the meetings continued, Hindu villagers observed that religious symbols and books were being distributed and that pressure increased with repeated visits and gatherings held late at night. Concerned about the impact on families and village harmony, Hindu residents came together and prepared a written complaint, which they submitted to the Bilkisganj police. They informed the authorities that what began as prayer meetings had turned into persistent inducement-based efforts that disturbed their religious freedom and daily life. The situation escalated on the night of 9 December 2025, when another gathering was organised, prompting villagers to alert the police immediately. Acting on the information, a police team reached the location, detained the individuals present and seized religious material, including multiple copies of the Bible and other items used during the meetings. Six people were arrested in the case: Mukesh Kapasia Barela, Lakhan Bhikam Singh Barela, Sitaram Kapasia Barela, Rem Singh Barkha Barela, Kushma Barela and Bina Barela, all residents of the Sehore and Rehti areas. A case was registered under Sections 3 and 5 of the Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act, 2021, which addressed religious conversions carried out through inducement and undue influence. Police officials stated that the action prevented further targeting of Hindu tribal villagers.

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Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category of: Predatory proselytisation; under which the first secondary category selected is: Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination; under which the tertiary category selected is: Victim says was brainwashed/groomed. 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. The second secondary category selected is: Conversion/attempts to convert. Predatory Proselytisation is not just limited to threat, harassment, force and violence, but it also has contours of stealth. In several cases, the Hindu victim is exploited to convert, with non-Hindus taking advantage of their poverty. In such cases, the Hindu victim who is suffering financially is offered monetary benefits, including lucrative offers for jobs, health treatment, education, etc, to induce the victim into changing his/her religion. In such cases, the religious identity of the victim and the aim to disenfranchise him from his faith form the heart of the crime. Also, taking advantage of and exploiting an individual’s economic vulnerabilities is widely acknowledged as exploitation, forms of which are often penalised by law. Such cases therefore are considered religiously motivated hate crimes since the victim’s religious identity forms the very heart of the crime itself. The third secondary 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 conduct in this case were neither spontaneous nor isolated. Hindu tribal villagers were approached repeatedly over a sustained period, indicating a planned and structured effort rather than incidental religious interaction. The fact that meetings were held at night, within village spaces and private residences, reduced transparency and increased psychological pressure, particularly on vulnerable families. This setting itself created an imbalance of power, placing the victims in situations where refusal became socially and emotionally difficult. The use of inducements such as cash assistance reportedly up to ₹1 lakh, promises of employment and assurances of healing or relief from hardship critically exposed the exploitative nature of the conduct. These offers were directed specifically at economically distressed Hindu families, demonstrating that vulnerability was not incidental but central to the strategy. Such inducements were not unconditional welfare measures; they were tied to the expectation of religious change. This transformed assistance into a coercive tool, where the victim’s Hindu identity became the obstacle to accessing help. In this way, poverty and distress were weaponised against the victims’ faith. The repeated religious messaging combined with material promises reflected grooming and subtle indoctrination rather than informed consent. Hindu villagers were not confronted with overt threats initially but were gradually subjected to psychological manipulation designed to weaken attachment to their ancestral religion. Over time, repeated exposure created confusion, emotional dependency and mental stress. The victims’ own expressions of fear, disturbance and pressure indicated that the process affected their autonomy and sense of religious security, a hallmark of brainwashing-based conversion attempts. Trust and familiarity played a critical role in the case. The gatherings occurred within the village and involved repeated contact, allowing relationships to develop between the perpetrators and the victims. This proximity fostered a false sense of trust, which was then exploited to transmit religious messaging and inducements. Such exploitation of social closeness magnified the harm, as villagers were influenced not by free choice but by emotional obligation and dependency, undermining genuine agency. The case also reflected harassment for conversion, even in the absence of overt violence. Continuous summoning of villagers, intrusion into village life and persistent persuasion interfered with the victims’ ability to practise Hinduism freely. The pressure was cumulative and oppressive, creating an environment where maintaining one’s faith came at the cost of social peace, mental well-being and material security. This interference constituted harassment rooted in religious discrimination, as it targeted Hindu villagers precisely because of their faith. Most critically, the animus in the case lay in the objective to erase the victims’ Hindu identity. The conduct was not about coexistence, dialogue or pluralism; it was about dismantling the victims’ relationship with their religion. The exclusive targeting of Hindu tribal villagers, combined with inducement-based conversion efforts, demonstrated that religious identity formed the core of the offence. The harm extended beyond individual victims to the erosion of community cohesion, cultural continuity and religious dignity. Taken together, every element of the case i.e sustained targeting, exploitation of poverty, inducements tied to conversion, psychological manipulation, abuse of trust and interference with religious freedom, pointed to a crime rooted in hostility towards the victims’ Hindu identity. Because the religious identity of the victims was both the reason for targeting and the objective of the conduct, the case was correctly classified as a religiously motivated hate crime arising from predatory proselytisation. Disclaimer: While police action and public reporting in this case occurred on 9 December 2025, the Hinduphobia Tracker has recorded the incident date as 9 September 2025. This is because the conversion-related activities, including inducement-based prayer meetings and sustained pressure on Hindu tribal villagers, had been taking place continuously for approximately three months prior to police intervention. The selected date reflects the beginning of the victim community’s ordeal rather than the date when the matter came to the attention of authorities. The Hinduphobia Tracker records incidents according to when the victim’s suffering began rather than when the story entered public reporting.