Rinima Borah from Kaliabor in Assam, who recently won the ‘Mrs India Galaxy 2024’ contest, revealed sensational facts on love jihad, conversion and trauma of inter-religious marriage in a popular podcast show. Talking with “Satya-The Truth,” Rinima Borah revealed how her former Islamist boyfriend had force-fed her beef and forced her to offer namaz during their relationship while she was a minor girl.
In this podcast, Rinima Borah said, I have endured mental torture, physical torture and rude behaviour of in-laws for the last 16 years. Maybe it will take me years to forget it, she added. I comfort myself every day by saying that those days are over. But even today, when some people say that it was all my fault, I still fight that battle. At the age of 16, I went to study in Bangalore. There, I got into a relationship with a Muslim boy. Later, he started harassing me. I thought maybe, like my parents, he was beating me for my own good. She said, many times I used to call him ‘Taliban’ after seeing his rude behaviour and the torture he did with me during the relationship. Every day, he used to beat me mercilessly. I remember the day he force-fed me beef. I knew it was beef, I was about to vomit, but he was forcing me to eat the beef meat, and I was helpless. His mother and father had forced me to eat that beef, and I feel like the world has come to an end for me. They even changed my name from Rinima Borah to Ayesha Hussain and forced me to offer namaz. During the interview, Rinima admitted that her situation was almost like love jihad. Her boyfriend also threatened to throw acid on her if she left him.
After this interview, the discussion on love jihad intensified on social media in Assam. People started alerting the girls by sharing her videos. But, as soon as it all started, Rinima Borah went back on her statements and denied the incidents of love jihad.
She admitted to forcibly offering namaz, feeding beef, and changing her name in the podcast but later posted that she does not believe in things like love jihad. “Thank you all for watching this reel, but I want to make one thing very clear. I don’t believe in or support the concept of ‘love jihad’. This is an ideology that I think goes against our fundamental rights to choose our relationships based on love, respect and understanding.”
But whatever her statement after the interview or the public criticism, it is clear that the evil of Love Jihad has haunted many girls in our society even though they are unable to talk about it in public out of fear or criticism.
