On September 9, a Dalit woman gave a complaint to the police, stating her alleged husband posed as a Hindu to trap her into a relationship. He is actually a Muslim and now he and his family members, are forcing her to convert to Islam. The man and family, since she moved with them, have been asking her to undergo ‘conversion nikah’, ‘halala’, and offer namaz. They also terminated her pregnancy thrice. Following the victim’s complaint, the police booked the accused under the Anti-conversion law and the SC-ST Act. The case pertains to the Ambedkar Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh.
The accused man has been identified as Daud Ibrahim, who posed as Rahul Gupta to trap and marry a Dalit woman as per Hindu rituals.
What says the FIR?
As per the First Information Report (number–522/2023) registered at the Akbarpur police station of the Ahmednagar district on September 9.
In her complaint, the victim, Asia Bharti told the police that, almost two years ago, one Daud Ibrahim, son of Wajid Ali alias Buddhu Kabadi, posed as Rahul Gupta to lure her into a relationship. He broke her previous marriage and took her with him. Whenever she asked him to get married, he made an excuse, they lived in a live-in relationship. Some time ago, she found out that the accused was a Muslim man and not a Hindu, and since then, he and his family have been pressuring her to convert to Islam. When she refused, they assaulted her and on September 1, threw her out of the house.
What said the police?
Based on the complaint registered by the victim, the police booked the accused under IPC sections 493 (invalid marriage), 504 (intentionally insult), 506 (criminal intimidation), with sections 3 and 5(1) of the Uttar Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act and sections of the Prevention of atrocities against and hate crimes against the scheduled case and scheduled tribes Act, 1989, also called as the SC-ST Act.
Speaking with Organiser, the Station House Officer, Malipur, Prem Chandra said, an FIR has been registered in this case at the Akbarpur police station.
He added, that the family of the woman married her to a Hindu man but leaving him she eloped with the accused and had a marriage as per Hindu rituals. She lived with him for two years and now saying that he is a Muslim and that his family is forcing her to convert.
Organiser tried calling the police but the calls went unanswered.
What said the victim?
This correspondent called the victim, Asiya Bharti, on September 11, and the following are some excerpts from the conversation between this correspondent and her.
Correspondent: Are you with your family now?
Asiya: No, I am living in a rented place with my daughter. My family left me long ago when, I left my husband for Rahul alias Daud, almost two years ago.
Correspondent: Who were you married to and how did you come in contact with Daud?
Asiya: I belong to the chamar jati, which falls in the scheduled caste category. I had known Rahul before my marriage but my family arranged the wedding with a man of their choice and caste. I was happily married to him and had a daughter. Then came, Rahul. He reached my in-law’s house and created a scene; with his allegations, my husband left me. My parental family also abandoned me, I had nowhere to go but to live with Rahul.
Correspondent: Were you married to Rahul or it was a live-in relationship?
Asiya: Initially, he kept me with him without marriage. Then I started having arguments with him regularly, so he took me to a nearby temple in the Usarpur–Malipur area, where we got married as per Hindu rituals. His friends joined in but not his family. Rahul never stayed with me for long, he used to come on vacations and then left for work. He lived in Surat, Gujarat. I asked him to get the marriage registered but he kept on making excuses.
Correspondent: How did you come to know about his true identity?
Asiya: I have been pressuring him to get the marriage registered and he keeps making excuses. One day, I created a ruckus and hence he had to shift the room. In a rush, he took me to a colony where his relatives lived, there people called him Daud Ibrahim, and the colony resided maximum Muslims, and then I learned that he is a Muslim.
Correspondent: What did you do after learning his true identity?
Asiya: I confronted him and questioned why he lied about his true religion, to which he said, he was madly in love with me and if he had introduced himself with his original name, I would have never agreed for the marriage or affair for that matter.
Correspondent: When did he take you to his parent’s house?
Asiya: After I learned about his true identity, I started pressuring him even more to get the marriage registered. He used to beat me up every time I said this. Then one day, out of nowhere, he took me to his house in Mirzapur Kodra. It was a normal house, I did not feel that they were Muslims, no pictures or anything else was there. Daud told his family that, I was a Muslim woman. He had even brought me a burqa before taking me home.
Correspondent: How does the problem begin?
Asiya: My daughter from the first husband turned 3, so I had to register her to the state health department to get the benefits of the scheme. Daud asked his younger brother to take me as he was not in home. During the registration, his brother saw my Adhar Card and other documents bearing a Hindu name. Since then, they started having problems with me. They asked me to undergo ‘Halala’ and accept Islam to have ‘nikah’ with Daud.
Correspondent: What did you do?
Asiya: I said, I will not convert. He was the one who hid his identity to trap me and now forcing me to convert, How can I become a Muslim? I don’t believe in them, I believe in my Krishna. She added that they would make bizarre demands like stop wearing Bindi, Mangalsutra, and toe-rings and putting Alta (Mahawar, red paint). I used to wear them as a symbol of marriage, they asked me to live their way and put mehendi instead. She said, Madam, the married women in this house look like a widow, they put nothing, How could I have followed that?
Correspondent: Did they teach you, how to offer namaz?
Asiya: They asked me to do Roza-Zakat and become a Namazi. They would discuss that, they could arrange a cleric who would teach me how to pray. One day, during an argument around my conversion, Daud’s sister said, she knew a cleric who would do the halala and get her converted to Islam. She said, I did not know what this halala was, but they kept saying that, to live with Daud, I would have to undergo Halala. (When this correspondent told her about Halala she was shocked).
Correspondent: What did they say about Hindus and Sanatan Dharma?
Asiya: They said, Hindus are fools, they pray to humans, How come humans become Bhagwan? There is only one Lord, and that is Allah. She asked them, if Allah appeared on the earth through some miracle, if was not human. To which they said, “You come from a village; that’s why you will never understand Islam” (Tum gao ki ho na islie tumhe kabhi Islam samajh nahi aaega).
Correspondent: Did they ever force you to eat beef?
Asiya: Madam, I will be truthful to you. Even though I am a non-vegetarian but till the time I was there in that house, I never had meat. I could not trust them, and only when I had been to the market to get the meat, I would eat it. She added that they used to say, ‘We will feed you beef’.
Correspondent: You mentioned in the media that you were pregnant when he threw you out.
Asiya: Mam, I was three months pregnant, but they terminated the baby by giving me pills without my knowledge. She added that when Daud took me to his parent’s house I was already pregnant with his baby, after his family learned thet started asking me to abort. When I refused, they gave me food and water and then, it started to bleed. This was not the first time that, I lost the foetus, this was the third time since I have moved in with Daud. I even talked to the paramedical students living in the colony and they said, this is not possible, as I already had a healthy daughter with my previous husband.
Correspondent: Till the time you had no idea about Daud’s religion, how was it living with him?
Asiya: Like a normal couple, he used to take care of my daughter, visit temples with me, offer prayers, wear kalwa and whatnot. Even his friends used to call him Rahul and not Daud. He allowed me to worship Bhagwan Krishna, since, I moved to his house he started talking about Allah, stopped me from praying, and whatnot.
Correspondent: What did your family say after they learned about his true identity?
Asiya: Since the day I left my husband, my parents stopped talking to me. I am in touch with my siblings and they must have told them about this, I never received a call from them to date. They have told my sister that, they think, ‘I am the one responsible for all my mysteries so I should suffer’.
Correspondent: What do you want now?
Asiya: I want him to suffer the same pain as I did, he used to beat me up regularly, having no place to go I bore everything. Now, it’s his time. I do not want other women to face the same as I did. How can he walk freely after doing this to me, he should be punished.
Asiya, has two sisters and two brothers, whereas, Daud had four brothers and sisters. They also run a Kabadiwala shop, while Daud works as a cloth merchant. The police are yet to nab him, the digital surveillance teams are identifying his location, and he will soon get arrested.
