Interfaith couple marries as per Hindu rituals; Muslim woman's family forces Hindu youth to convert and remarry under Islamic rites
Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India 
3 September, 2023
Case Summary
In Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, a young Hindu man named Ankit married a Muslim girl as per Hindu customs. Then, the girl's father forcibly converted him to Islam and got them remarried as per Islamic rituals. The victim man Ankit and his wife Farina, both belonged to Nathupur village. They felt that their families would not be accepting of their marriage. They ran away from home, got married as per Hindu customs and returned. Ankit's family accepted Farina as their daughter-in-law. However, the Muslim girl's father, Shamim, who was a Maulvi by profession, did not accept their relationship. He forced the Hindu youth to convert to Islam and named him Chand Mohammad. A video of Ankit and Farina performing Nikah went viral on social media. Ankit's father filed a written complaint with the police regarding his son's forced conversion and marriage.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
In such cases, a non-Hindu woman marries a Hindu man and the force/pressure against the Hindu man to convert to Islam begins after marriage. In such cases, the marriage is consensual in most cases and often, there is no element of the non-Hindu woman hiding her religious identity. The marriage could be under the Special Marriages Act where neither parties are required to convert their religion for the marriage to be considered legitimate. While the victim in such cases enters matrimony assuming that religious identity is not a barrier, the non-Hindu woman starts to pressure the Hindu man to convert to Islam after marriage. In such cases, there is application of force/pressure by the perpetrator, including, denial of the man’s religious rights. Some of the means by which the man is forced/pressured to convert include forcing/pressurizing the man to involuntarily consume beef, pressurizing/forcing to read the Kalma, forced circumcision, forced to go to the mosque, etc. There are several instances where after marriage, the man voluntarily converts to Islam. Such cases are often argued to be a result of religious brainwashing, however, for the purpose of documenting religiously motivated hate crimes, in the absence of the victim complaining of forced conversion, such cases do not form a part of the database. In this case, the Hindu man married the Muslim woman assuming that their religious identities would not be a hindrance in their married life, however, the Muslim woman's family started applying pressure on the victim to convert to Islam and follow Islamic principles, like remarry as per Islamic rules. What makes this case worthy of being documented as a religiously motivated hate crime is that the Hindu youth was harassed by the family of the Muslim woman simply for his relationship with her and by virtue of him following the Hindu faith and not the religion of the non-Hindu woman.
Victim Details
Total Victim
1
Deceased
0
Gender
- Male 1
- Female 0
- Third Gender 0
- Unknown 0
Caste
- SC/ST 0
- OBC 0
- General 0
- Unknown 1
Age Group
- Minor 0
- Adult 1
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 0
Case Status
Complaint filed
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
