Hindu woman lured into a relationship by a Muslim man posing as Hindu, blackmailed and forced to convert to Islam

Case ID : ea349b9 | Location : Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh, India | Date of Incident : Fri, 31 December, 2021

Case ID : ea349b9

Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh, India

31 December, 2021

Hindu woman lured into a relationship by a Muslim man posing as Hindu, blackmailed and forced to convert to Islam

Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes

Blackmailed to convert

Man pretends to be Hindu

Name Changed

Rape for refusal to convert

Case Summary

In the Sambhal district of Uttar Pradesh, a Hindu woman became the victim of severe exploitation and sexual abuse after being lured into a relationship by a Muslim man through social media. The accused had hidden his religious identity and posed as a Hindu to trap the victim. He exploited her under the pretext of marriage and eventually began pressuring her to give up her faith and adopt Islam. The ordeal began around three years ago when the woman, a resident of Aligarh, came into contact with a Muslim man from Aurangpur Sileta village via Facebook. The man had created a fake identity under the Hindu name ‘Abhi’ to gain her trust. Through calculated deception and emotional manipulation, he promised to marry her, which led the woman to leave her home and move to Chandausi along with her two young children. The accused kept her in a rented house in Railway Gate Colony, where he stayed with her in a live-in relationship under the false promise of marriage for three years. In time, the woman came to know the accused's real identity and religion. When she confronted him and expressed her intention to end the relationship, he threatened to make her objectionable photos public to intimidate and control her. To trumatise her further, the accused got her raped from his brother. On April 20, the accused called the woman to his village where, he again got her raped by two other men. Subsequently, on April 26, the accused and his accomplices forced her to convert her religion against her will. Unable to bear the ongoing mental, physical, and sexual abuse, the victim finally approached the Chandausi police station and lodged a formal complaint against the man and his associates. As of the date this report was written, the police had registered the complaint, and the matter was being investigated.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category of: - Crimes against women in relationships and other sexual crimes. Within the sub-category selected is: - Blackmailed to convert. When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman is blackmailed to convert her religion, owing to her religious identity of being a Hindu. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim, however, there could be cases where the relationship is not consensual and the non-Hindu man starts blackmailing a Hindu woman to convert her religion. In these cases, it is often seen that the Hindu woman is blackmailed with intimate photos and/or videos, threats of harm to her or her family, threats of violence etc. Such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim and are therefore qualified as hate crimes. The other sub-category selected here is: - Man pretends to be Hindu, with the tertiary sub-category being: - 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 third sub-category relevant here is: - Rape for refusal to convert When Hindu women are in a relationship with non-Hindu men, there are cases where the woman faces pressure/threats/violence to convert and change her religious identity by the non-Hindu man. Such relationships may be consensual with the religious identity of the non-Hindu man known to the victim. Somewhere along the relationship, the non-Hindu man starts pressuring the Hindu woman to convert. In some of these cases, the association could be non-consensual as well or, the religious identity of the non-Muslim man could be previously unknown to the Hindu victim. As the case may be, in such cases, the non-Hindu man forces himself sexually on the Hindu woman when she refuses his advances and pressures to convert her religion. The rape of the woman is often seen as either a punishment for the woman refusing to convert. Such cases are driven by specific religious motivations and against the religious identity of the victim and are therefore qualified as hate crimes. This case is a clear instance of a religiously motivated hate crime, where a Hindu woman was deliberately targeted by a Muslim man who deceived her by pretending to be Hindu. This act of deceit itself is a form of manipulation rooted in religious bias, aimed at undermining the woman's ability to make an informed decision about her relationship and religious life. By misrepresenting his identity, the accused violated the woman's trust. Using a false identity, he lured her into a live-in relationship under the false pretext of marriage and established sexual relations based on this deceit. After the woman came to know about his real identity, he blackmailed her by threatening to leak her intimate pics online if she attempted to leave. The use of blackmail to force conversion is a clear demonstration of religious hate, as it targets the victim's religious beliefs and seeks to erase her identity. Further compounding the abuse, the man began pressuring her to convert to Islam. When she refused, he raped her, along with his brother. This disturbing pattern of coercion through sexual violence is consistent with cases where women are forced into submission to fulfil the perpetrator's objective of religious conversion. The targeting of the victim based on her Hindu identity, the deception of religious identity by the perpetrator, and the subsequent violence all align with known patterns of abuse that are recognised as hate crimes. Such cases fit a well-documented pattern where Muslim men target non-Muslims, particularly Hindus, for religious conversion through deceit, coercion, threats, and acts of violence, including sexual assault. The use of false identities combined with sexual violence reveals a deeper and more sinister motivation that is rooted in animosity within Islam towards non-Muslims. Within Islam, the conversion of non-Muslims is seen as a religious duty, and even coercive and violent methods are justified under religious pretexts. This case, therefore, not only involves sexual violence but also represents a targeted assault against the religious identity of the victim, making it a clear case of a hate crime driven by religiously motivated intentions. Disclaimer: Media reports state that the victim’s ordeal began when she met the accused in 2022, though no exact date or month is provided. To document this case, we have used an indicative date—January 1, 2022—as a placeholder to represent the beginning of her suffering. While media coverage of the incident emerged on April 29, 2025, the Hinduphobia Tracker records the incident based on when the victim’s ordeal began, not when it was reported.