Hindu girl deceived, sexually exploited, and pressured for conversion by Muslim man posing as Hindu in Bareilly

Case ID : e27524d | Location : Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Fri, 21 July, 2023

Case ID : e27524d

Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India

21 July, 2023

Hindu girl deceived, sexually exploited, and pressured for conversion by Muslim man posing as Hindu in Bareilly

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Forced conversion before marriage

Brainwashed and/or groomed

Rape and sexual assault/harassment

Case Summary

In Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, a Hindu girl was deceived, sexually exploited and pressured for religious conversion by a Muslim man named Tauheed, who posed as a Hindu man. According to the complaint filed by the victim, she stated that about two years ago, in 2023, while bathing in the Ramganga river, she met a photographer, Tauheed, who introduced himself as a Hindu man named Akash Singh. He clicked her photos, and they exchanged phone numbers as well. Gradually, the accused trapped the girl into a relationship and sexually exploited her, under the false promise of marriage, while continuing to maintain his false Hindu identity. When the victim began pressuring him for marriage, the accused revealed his true identity, that his name was Tauheed and that he was a Muslim. He told her that he would only marry her if she converted to Islam. He began pressuring her to convert to Islam. Based on her complaint, the police arrested Tauheed and sent him to jail. The Fast-Track Court of Additional Sessions Judge Ashok Kumar Yadav later rejected his bail application, with the government lawyer stating that he had links to a larger religious conversion racket.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category- Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. Within this, the subcategory selected is- Man pretends to be Hindu. The tertiary category selected is- Name Changed. 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 other subcategory selected is- Forced conversion before marriage. In such cases, a non-Hindu man is in a relationship with a Hindu woman when the pressure to convert her religion begins to manifest. In such cases, typically, two patterns emerge. First, when the relationship is consensual, and the religious identity of the perpetrator is known to the Hindu woman in the relationship, however, at some point during the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts to force the victim to convert her religion and give up her Hindu religious identity. The second is when the woman gets into a marriage with the man pretending to share her faith. Later, when the truth is revealed, the man starts pressuring the woman to convert her religion and give up her religious identity. In both the situations, the methods used to force the victim to convert her religion often revolve around force-feeding beef, forcing her to wear hijab, forcing her to read the Kalma or even pressurizing the victim to do ‘Nikah’, which is marriage under Islamic law, with a prerequisite being conversion to Islam. Cases where a Hindu woman consensually converts to Islam in a relationship will be left out of the hate crime database, even though it could be argued in several cases that the conversion was a result of religious brainwashing. The third sub-category selected here is - Brainwashed and/or groomed, with the tertiary category being - Rape and sexual assault/harassment. In our database, we have not added incidents where women have converted to another religion of their free will and no allegations of forced/involuntary conversion have been made. However, there are certain cases of conversion where the consent itself is a result of the brainwashing or grooming of a minor by the non-Hindu perpetrator trying to victimise a woman for her Hindu religious identity. The phenomenon of grooming points to non-Hindu perpetrators identifying their Hindu victims’ vulnerabilities and exploiting them over months and sometimes years, to extract the supposed ‘consent’ in order to convert their religion. In most cases of grooming, the victims are minors or the grooming started when the victim was a minor. In other cases of grooming, the non-Hindu perpetrator brainwashes and grooms a minor victim to extract their trust and then proceeds to rape them repeatedly with the intent of converting them to their faith. It is pertinent to understand here that when the victim is a minor, the ‘consent’ to convert or enter into a romantic relationship with an adult itself is redundant – addressed by POCSO. While every case of conversion of a minor and incidents of establishing a physical relationship with a minor by an adult is a crime, for the purpose of this database, a case would be considered a hate crime only if there is a distinct religious angle to the grooming. For example, in the UK, if a Hindu minor is targeted by Pakistani grooming gangs, it would be considered a hate crime because the victims are specifically targeted owing to their non-Muslim religious identity with the perpetrators being Muslim. In other cases, if a Hindu minor is brainwashed into entering a physical relationship with the non-Hindu adult perpetrator and the family alleges grooming/brainwashing of the minor to convert her religion, it would form a part of this database. If the victim is a Hindu adult, the case would form a part of this database only if the victim herself says that she was brainwashed/groomed to convert her religion. However, if the victim is deceased (murdered or otherwise), the case would form a part of this database if her family/friends provided testimony that the victim was brainwashed/groomed to convert her religion. Since these crimes have a distinct religious angle where the victim is being targeted owing to her Hindu religious identity, these cases are considered a hate crime. This case has been added to the tracker because a Hindu girl was lured into a relationship by a Muslim man, who pretended to be Hindu. The perpetrator deliberately concealed his religious identity to initiate and sustain a relationship with a Hindu girl. 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, reflecting a deeper animosity towards Hindus and their beliefs. Furthermore, the Hindu girl was sexually exploited by the Muslim man who maintained this false Hindu identity. This was not simply an act of sexual assault; rather, it was a deliberate targeting of a Hindu girl because of her faith. The pretence of being Hindu to gain her trust, only to sexually violate her, shows clear intent rooted in religious bias. His manipulation and exploitation demonstrate that the crime was driven by prejudice towards Hindus and Hinduism itself. Often, in such cases, sexual exploitation serves as a manipulative tactic designed to strip the victim of agency and push her into submission, including religious conversion. The intention is to break the victim down emotionally, physically, and spiritually, so that she becomes more susceptible to conversion in the future. When the accused's true identity was revealed, he began pressuring her to convert to Islam if she wanted to marry him. This revealed that his deception and exploitation were carried out with the calculated intention of achieving his underlying objective of religious conversion. By doing so, he violated the girl’s fundamental right to practise her own faith and attempted to strip her of her Hindu identity. These actions reflect entrenched religious hostility and disdain towards Hindus and Hinduism, making this case a clear example of a religiously motivated hate crime. Disclaimer: Media reports state that the victim's ordeal began when she met the accused two years ago in 2023, though no exact date or month is provided. It is, however, mentioned that she filed her complaint on July 22. Thus, to document this case, we have used an indicative date—July 22, 2023—as a placeholder to represent the beginning of her suffering. While media coverage of the incident emerged on August 29, 2025, the Hinduphobia Tracker records the incident based on when the victim’s ordeal began, not when it was reported.