Muslim man pretends to be Hindu on social media to lure Hindu woman, caught while attempting to elope
Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, India 
16 June, 2023
Case Summary
A Hindu woman’s family filed a complaint with the Gandhi Park police station when one Zahid, who builds cabinets for a living in Meerut, trapped the woman for 6 months by posing as a Hindu named Aryan on Instagram. For 6 months, they kept messaging each other on Instagram until they decided to elope. The Meerut-based Zahid arrived in Aligarh on June 17, 2023. He handed some intoxicating pills to the Hindu woman and asked her to mix them with her family’s food. Zahid also told the woman to get money and ornaments from her house. They were caught by the police shortly after attempting to elope. The woman was handed over to her family and Zahid was arrested.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
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. In this case, a non-Hindu man concealed his religious identity and pretended to be a Hindu to lure a Hindu woman. Since the religious motive of the crime is evident from the fact that the man pretended to be a Hindu to trap a Hindu woman, this case has been documented 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 0
- Adult 0
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 1
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
