Minor Hindu girl lured, abducted and pressured for religious conversion by Muslim youth

Case ID : e274ec9 | Location : Baghpat, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Wed, 2 July, 2025

Case ID : e274ec9

Baghpat, Uttar Pradesh, India

2 July, 2025

Minor Hindu girl lured, abducted and pressured for religious conversion by Muslim youth

Predatory Proselytisation

Proselytisation by grooming, brainwashing, manipulation or subtle indoctrination

Conversion of minor

Harassment, threats, coercion for conversion

Conversion/ attempts to convert by inducement

Case Summary

In Saindpur Kala village of Baghpat district, Uttar Pradesh, a minor Dalit Hindu girl was abducted and pressured for religious conversion by a Muslim youth and his uncle. According to reports, the Muslim youth, a resident of Baragaon, lured the minor girl away from her home and instructed her to bring along cash and jewellery. After a few days, the uncle of the accused began pressuring the minor girl for religious conversion and marriage. Despite the coercion, the girl refused to change her faith, due to which she was subjected to harassment. After the victim's father filed a complaint, police launched a search for the girl. Based on a tip-off, police rescued the minor girl and handed her over to her family, while the accused youth was arrested and sent to jail. Subsequently, the youth's uncle also attempted to lure the girl again with the promise of marriage. The victim’s father reported that the ongoing threats and manipulation had severely affected the family's mental well-being, making it difficult for them to sleep due to fear. He demanded that strict action be taken against the uncle to ensure his daughter's safety. As of the date of writing this report, the investigation was ongoing, and police indicated that the case might be connected to a larger religious conversion racket.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category of - Predatory Proselytisation. 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. The third sub-category selected here is - Conversion/ attempts to convert by inducement. 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. This case has been added to the tracker because a minor Dalit Hindu was abducted and pressured for religious conversion by a Muslim youth and his uncle. The minor girl was deliberately targeted and manipulated by the accused into stealing money and jewellery from her own house before abducting her for the eventual goal of religious conversion. By kidnapping her, the accused aimed to isolate her and sever her connection from her cultural roots, her social environment, and any form of external support, thereby increasing her vulnerability and making her conversion easier. The abduction was not a random criminal act—it was motivated by the perpetrators’ desire to assert control and erase her Hindu identity. Such acts violate the girl's right to practice her religion freely. When the girl refused to convert, she was subjected to harassment by the accused, which further proves the religious animosity of the accused towards Hinduism. The accused wanted to convert the girl at any cost. Additionally, when all efforts failed and the accused was arrested, the accused's uncle offered her an inducement in the form of a promise of marriage, thus continuing the cycle of coercion and manipulation. 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 till 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. Furthermore, it is 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, and the Muslim perpetrator purposely targeted and exploited this vulnerability of the victim. 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.