Muslim man lures a minor Hindu girl, kidnaps and rapes her, converts her and does Nikah
Fatehpur, Uttar Pradesh, India 
27 June, 2023
Case Summary
In the Fatehpur district of Uttar Pradesh, a Muslim man by the name of Mohammed Raju alias Rajul lured a minor Hindu girl, kidnapped her and raped her before forcefully converting her to Islam and tying the knot. The incident reportedly occurred on June 28, 2023 at the Dharmpur Suswan Khurd hamlet under the Asothar police station. The 16-year-old girl had gone missing after going towards the field at around 7 pm that day. Her family registered a missing person complaint with the police on July 1. Md. Raju's name was mentioned as a suspect in the complaint by locals. The police launched an investigation and tracked his cellphone number but he was able to flee when they stormed his hiding place. However, the police succeeded in rescuing the young girl. She was wearing a burqa when the police found her and brought her to the police station. The girl told him that she was kidnapped by the accused and taken to a relative’s house where she was raped repeatedly. After some days, he called a cleric and both of them forced her to become a Muslim, after which Md Raju forcefully married her. She received warnings of repercussions for refusing to learn Islamic rituals and she was brutally assaulted and death threats were issued when she objected. After recovering the girl, a case has been registered against the absconding accused youth under IPC sections including kidnapping, rape, religious conversion and POCSO Act.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
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. In this subcategory, we would only include cases where the victim was harassed, threatened or coerced to convert. Cases where attempts were made to convert but the victim resisted would be documented in another sub-category. 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. In this case, the Muslim perpetrator exploited the victim's familiarity with him to pressure her to marry and convert to Islam, by deploying threats and violence. As per the victim's testimony, he raped and forcefully converted her to Islam. He performed Nikah with her against her will. The accused then assaulted her and threatened her with death if she did not follow Islamic practices. Due to the fear of harm that might come to her, she could not do much. The underlying motivation of predatory proselytisation itself is animosity towards the professed faith of the victim. In this case, there was violence involved in the pressure exerted to forcefully convert the Hindu woman. Further, the central aim of the perpetrator was to disenfranchise the Hindu woman from her professed faith. Since the central motivation is religion, this case has been added as a hate crime.
Victim Details
Total Victim
1
Deceased
0
Gender
- Male 0
- Female 1
- Third Gender 0
- Unknown 0
Caste
- SC/ST 0
- OBC 0
- General 0
- Unknown 1
Age Group
- Minor 1
- Adult 0
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 0
Case Status
Complaint registered
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
