Minor Hindu girl gangraped and blackmailed with recorded video; victim's family threatened with fake SC/ST case
Darbhanga, Bihar, India 
14 March, 2025
Case Summary
In Darbhanga, Bihar, a case of sexual assault of a minor girl came to the fore. A 16-year-old Hindu girl was gangraped by 10 persons on the night of 15th March. The accused recorded videos of the heinous act. They abandoned the victim on the spot in an injured and unconscious state. After the incident, the culprits threatened her family with a fake SC/ST case if they approached the police or told anyone about the incident. Afraid of being falsely implicated by the culprits, the victim’s family did not initially approach the police to complain about the gangrape. The accused kept threatening the victim through video calls and pressured her to come to meet them whenever they called her. They threatened to release her video if she did not comply with their demands. Ten days after the incident, the family of the victim mustered the courage to approach the police On her way, one of the accused named Durgesh Paswan lured her and took her to Dhobiyaahi Gachi, where the other 9 accused, namely Sumit Paswan, Dilkhush Paswan, Sachit Paswan, Amit Paswan, Ankush Paswan, Sujit Paswan, Vishal Paswan, Raghav Paswan and Ankit Paswan were already present. All of them were drunk. They gangraped the girl and recorded videos of the heinous act. The culprits abandoned the victim on the spot in an injured and unconscious state. A person found the girl without clothes after the incident. According to reports, the mother of the 16-year-old victim informed that the accused gangraped her daughter and recorded the act. They also threatened to implicate her under the Harijan Act (The Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989) if she told anyone about the incident. “My daughter said that the accused had also made a video and threatened to make it viral. Due to this fear, I was not going to the police, but when the matter came to light in the village, some people encouraged us, after which we went to the police. The accused had threatened to implicate the minor under the Harijan Act if she informed about the incident”.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case is undoubtedly horrific, involving sexual violence and coercion. However, for it to be classified as a religiously motivated hate crime, there must be clear evidence that the victim was targeted explicitly because of her Hindu identity. Since the victim in this case is a minor, there is a strong suspicion that grooming may have been involved. Grooming is a well-documented phenomenon in which Muslim men deliberately target minor non-Muslim girls for sexual exploitation, abuse, and rape, often with the intent of coercing them into conversion or long-term subjugation. Given this context, the fact that the accused lured the Hindu minor raises serious concerns. However, while the victim's family has explicitly accused the perpetrator of deception and entrapment, there is no concrete evidence at this stage to confirm that religious animosity or a conversion agenda was a motivating factor behind the crime. Key indicators such as forced religious conversion or religious coercion are absent from the available information. Here, one can argue that the culprits used intimidation tactics—threatening to file a false SC/ST case—to silence the victim and her family. While this demonstrates a clear abuse of legal provisions to protect themselves, this also does not necessarily indicate that the crime was driven by religious hatred. Unless further evidence emerges showing that the perpetrators acted out of animosity towards the victim's Hindu identity—such as using anti-Hindu slurs, forcing conversion, or making derogatory remarks about her faith—it would be best to include this case under the ‘Undecided’ category. However, if additional details later confirm that the victim was targeted due to her religion, it can be reclassified within the Hate Crime database.
Victim Details
Total Victim
1
Deceased
0
Gender
- Male 0
- Female 1
- Third Gender 0
- Unknown 0
Caste
- SC/ST 1
- OBC 0
- General 0
- Unknown 0
Age Group
- Minor 1
- Adult 0
- Senior Citizen 0
- Unknown 0
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Others
Perpetrators Range
From 5 to 10
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
