Minor Hindu girl abducted, forcibly converted to Islam and married to a Muslim man
Naini Tal, Uttarakhand, India 
3 April, 2025
Case Summary
In Nainital, Uttarakhand, a Hindu minor girl was abducted and subjected to child marriage by a Muslim man, Hamza Khan. She was also forcibly converted to Islam and made to recite the Kalma. According to the complaint filed by the victim's family, the 15-year-old girl from Basai in Rajasthan was lured away by a Muslim man named Hamza Khan. The girl, who was studying in the Thana Para area, was taken to Nainital on April 4, 2025, where she was coerced into converting from Hinduism to Islam. She was renamed as Sania Hamza Khan and was forced to recite Kalma, after which she was married off with the assistance of a Maulvi. The girl's mother stated that her daughter was forced to recite the Kalma under pressure, as she did not even know how to recite it on her own. The victim’s father emphasised that Hamza Khan deliberately targeted their minor daughter, and the family strongly believed that the entire act was a calculated attempt to exploit and harm the girl. Following public outcry and media attention, the police eventually arrested the accused, Hamza Khan, recovered the girl, and assured a thorough investigation into the matter. The girl was shifted to a safe location, and authorities registered a case under relevant sections.
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: Family claims grooming and 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. This case is a clear instance of a religiously motivated hate crime, as the victim, a minor Hindu girl, was forcibly abducted, converted to Islam, and married off at the age of 15 to a Muslim man, Hamza Khan. The circumstances of her abduction, forced recitation of the Kalma, and coerced conversion indicate that she was targeted specifically because of her Hindu identity. These actions are not isolated but reflect a broader and troubling pattern of predatory proselytisation, particularly involving non-Muslim minors who are lured, manipulated, or forcibly converted under duress. Here, since the victim was a minor, it essentially means that the element of consent and genuine change of conscience was missing ab initio. It is a well-established fact that children are more susceptible to manipulation since they are still developing emotionally, cognitively, and socially. Their brains are not fully mature, making them more vulnerable. This case demonstrates a calculated strategy of targeting those who are less able to resist or understand the long-term implications of conversion, making it a significant case of religious-motivated hate crime. Such incidents reflect a broader pattern in Islam, wherein the act of religious conversion is pursued through coercive and unethical means, sometimes even through abduction and forced marriage, as seen in this case. Such predatory 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. Given that these actions are driven by doctrinal animosity towards Hinduism and its adherents, this case is being recorded as a religiously motivated hate crime and included in the tracker.
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
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
