* Police in India initiated a crackdown on interfaith marriage ceremoniesand apprehended at least 10 Muslim men under a law that prohibits forcedreligious conversions, The Guardian reported.*
As per details, Uttar Pradesh police interrupted marriages between Muslimsand Hindus and arrested at least 10 Muslim men under new laws prohibitingso-called “love jihad”.
The Hindu right-wing conspiracy theory, “love jihad” states that Muslim menlure Hindu women into marriage in order to force them to convert to Islam.The central government admitted that it has no official records of any suchincidents. However, this theory has been used to justify legislationenacted in Uttar Pradesh and is proposed in four other Indian states.
Earlier this week, UP’s Kushinagar police stopped a marriage between twoMuslims after it raided a place on a tip-off by a Hindu right-wing group.The police stormed the ceremony and arrested Haider Ali. They kept him incustody overnight and tortured him for hours using a leather belt. The manwas released after the family proved that the bride was Muslim by birth.
The recent action by Indian police has raised fears that Muslims are beingtargeted. Under this law, no Hindus have been arrested.
A day after the law was enacted in December, police raided a ceremony inLucknow where a marriage between a Hindu woman, Raina Gupta and a Muslimman, Mohammad Asif was under way. The wedding ceremony was to include bothHindu and Muslim rituals and the families said neither was going to converttheir religion. However, police halted the wedding and prevented thefamilies from going ahead.
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In another case that took place in 2019, a Muslim man, Owais Ahmad, wasarrested and sentenced to 14 days judicial custody for allegedly trying topressure a Muslim woman into converting to Islam. The woman is married to aHindu man now and Ahmad said he had “no link with the woman”.
Similarly, a 27-year-old Muslim man Rashid and his brother were detained bypolice in Moradabad after attempting to register Rashid’s marriage to a22-year-old Hindu woman, Muskan Jahan, who had converted to Islam beforethe wedding.
Rashid is in prison on charges of forcible conversion of his wife, andJahan was taken to a shelter. She denied any coercion and said, “I am anadult. I am 22 years old. I got married of my own free will.”
