Dalit Hindu woman assaulted, subjected to casteist slurs and death threats by Muslim men over minor dispute in Uttar Pradesh

Case ID : d327414 | Location : Pilibhit, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Wed, 28 January, 2026

Case ID : d327414

Pilibhit, Uttar Pradesh, India

28 January, 2026

Dalit Hindu woman assaulted, subjected to casteist slurs and death threats by Muslim men over minor dispute in Uttar Pradesh

Attack not resulting in death

Communal clash/attack

Hate speech against Hindus

Anti-Hindu slurs, mocking faith

Case Summary

In Dang village, located in the Jehanabad police station area, Pilibhit, Uttar Pradesh, a Hindu woman belonging to the Dalit community was attacked and issued casteist slurs by Muslim men over a minor dispute. The accused also subjected the victim to death threats. This incident came to light after the victim, Anita Kumari, the wife of Sohanlal, filed a complaint against the Muslim perpetrators at the Jehanabad police station. In the complaint, the victim stated that on 29 January 2026, at around 7 pm, her calf uprooted the peg and ran away along with the rope. Near the village canal, the calf's rope got entangled in the bike of a Muslim man named Akhtar, a resident of the village, due to which the bike collided with the calf and fell on the ground. This minor incident enraged the Muslim accused, Akhtar and his Muslim accomplices, Zulfiqar, Mohammad Zaid, Parveen, and Monish B. After this, the Muslim group entered the victim's house. All of them abused and assaulted her. She was also given death threats and casteist slurs. Hearing the commotion, local Hindu residents gathered at the spot, after which the accused left from there. On receiving the information, the Jehanabad police reached the spot and pacified both parties by convincing them. Based on the complaint of the victim, the police registered a case against six Muslim men under sections of assault and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. Station in-charge Pradeep Kumar Bishnoi said that the named accused Akhtar, Zulfiqar and Mohammad Zaid were arrested, while the search continued for others.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case is being added to the tracker under the first primary category- Attack not resulting in death. The subcategory selected is- Communal Clash/Attack. Communal clash is a form of collective violence that involves clashes between groups belonging to different religious identities. For a communal clash between Hindus and non-Hindus to qualify as a religiously motivated hate crime, the trigger of the violence itself would have to be anti-Hindu in essence. For example, if there is a Hindu religious procession that comes under attack from a non-Hindu mob and after the initial attack, Hindus retaliate in self-defence, leading to a communal clash between the two religious communities. While at a later stage, both communities are involved in the clash/violence, the initial trigger of the violence was by the non-Hindu mob against the Hindus and therefore, it could safely be termed as an anti-Hindu violence. Further, the trigger would also have to be religiously motivated. In the cited example, the attack by the non-Hindu mob was against religious processions and therefore, can be concluded to be religiously motivated. In some cases, the trigger may be non-religious, however, it develops into religious violence against Hindus at a later stage. In such cases too, the foundational animosity towards Hindus becomes the motivating factor of the crime and therefore, it would be classified as a religiously motivated hate crime against Hindus under this category. Another primary category selected is- Hate Speech against Hindus. The subcategory selected is- Anti-Hindu slurs, mocking faith. Anti-Hindu slurs and the deliberate mocking of the Hindu faith owing to religious animosity involve the usage of derogatory terms, stereotypes, or offensive references to religious practices, symbols, or figures. One of the common anti-Hindu slurs used against Hindus is “cow-worshipper” and “cow piss drinker”. The intention of using this term is to demean and mock Hindus as a group and their religious beliefs since Hindus consider the cow holy. Additionally, some symbols and the slurs attached to them have a historical context that exacerbates the insult, hate, stereotyping, dehumanisation and oppression against Hindus. Cow worship has been used for centuries to denigrate Hindus, insult their faith and oppress Hindus specifically as a religious group. There has been overwhelming documentation about how cow slaughter has been used to persecute Hindus with cow meat being thrown in temples and places of worship. There has also been overwhelming documentation where cow meat (beef) has been force-fed to Hindus to either forcefully convert them to Islam or denigrate their faith. Apart from cow worship, the Swastika – which holds deep religious significance for the Hindus – has also been misinterpreted and distorted to use as a slur against Hindus. Similarly, the worship of the Shivling has been used by supremacist ideologies and religions to denigrate Hindus owing to religious animosity. Such slurs and denigration stem out of inherent animosity and hate towards Hindus and their faith, therefore, it is categorised as hate speech targeted at Hindus specifically owing to their religious identity. This case constituted a clear instance of a religiously motivated crime, as Muslim perpetrators brutally attacked a Hindu woman and threatened her with death over a minor dispute, while also hurling casteist slurs at her. The disproportionate violence launched by the perpetrators against the Hindu woman, combined with their use of casteist slurs, demonstrated that she was targeted specifically for her religious identity as a Hindu. This brutal attack on a Hindu woman over a trivial issue involving a calf further underscored the religiously motivated nature of the crime, with the severity of the violence making its bias against her faith even clearer. This incident also exemplified a communal attack, as it pitted a group of Muslim men against a Hindu victim due to her faith identity in a violent confrontation rooted in religious tensions. The escalation from a minor accident to a home invasion, severe beating, death threats, and caste-based abuse highlighted inter-community hostility, with Hindus gathering in response to the commotion, revealing the broader communal divide triggered by the religiously charged assault. The aspect of hurling casteist slurs made the religious animosity completely clear in this case. While it could be argued by some that a caste-specific slur targeted the victim's micro-identity of belonging to the Dalit section of the Hindu community and not her Hindu identity itself, in the context of Abrahamic religious perspectives, micro-identities of caste, region, and language remained secondary. The perpetrator's animosity towards the Hindu victim stemmed fundamentally from her religious identity. In this case, while the Muslim accused hurled casteist abuses at the victim, the violence was driven by animosity towards Hinduism and Hindus. Although the immediate trigger of the violence was the minor incident with the calf, the fact that casteist slurs were used against the victim by the perpetrators made it a religiously motivated hate crime against her. Additionally, the act of issuing death threats to the victim showcased that the perpetrators sought to intimidate her specifically due to her Hindu identity, making it a clear case of religious animosity. Such instances of attacks on a Hindu individual due to their identity, accompanied by casteist slurs and death threats, served as a means to assert Islamic supremacy in public spaces and local areas, thereby constituting an anti-Hindu hate crime. Notably, the Hinduphobia Tracker has previously documented numerous instances where initial non-religious triggers have sparked full-blown communal violence against Hindus by Muslims. For example, on 30th May 2025, in Dewran Garhiya village, Farrukhabad, Uttar Pradesh, a minor verbal altercation between two Hindu men and a Muslim man escalated into a violent assault by a large Muslim mob, inflaming communal tensions. In another incident on 7th July 2025 in Bhavna Nagar, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, a Hindu family was brutally attacked by a Muslim mob of nearly 80 people following a simple dispute over garbage disposal. Victims suffered severe injuries from sharp weapons. Similarly, on 22nd June 2025 in Ghongade Basti, Solapur, Maharashtra, a minor road dispute led to a targeted communal assault on Hindus by a large Muslim mob, sparking widespread clashes. Given that this particular incident meets the parameters of a hate crime, and considering the previous instances of such communal attacks, this case has been added to the hate crime database of the Hinduphobia Tracker.