A petition filed in the Supreme Court has sought stringent legal action against alleged forced and organised religious conversions, arguing that such acts, when carried out in a structured and coercive manner, should be treated as a “terrorist act” under Indian criminal law. The plea has been filed in the backdrop of the ongoing controversy surrounding allegations of harassment and alleged conversion pressure at the Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) Nashik office, which is already under investigation by a Special Investigation Team.
The petition has been filed by BJP leader Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay through advocate Ashwani Dubey. It seeks directions from the Supreme Court to declare that deceitful or forced religious conversions carried out through organised systems of pressure, inducement or coercion should fall within the ambit of Section 113 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023, and also attract provisions under Section 15 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.
At the core of the plea is the argument that such activities are not isolated incidents but structured actions that may threaten social cohesion, national unity and internal security. The petition claims that if conversions are carried out through organised networks, they should be treated with the same seriousness as other grave offences affecting sovereignty and public order.
The plea also invokes constitutional provisions, particularly Article 25, which guarantees freedom of conscience and the right to profess, practice and propagate religion, while making it clear that such rights are subject to public order, health and morality.
The petition states, “The expression does not mean that every person is free to do whatever they wish in the name of religion. Rather, it means that everyone has the right freely to profess, practise and propagate, but this freedom itself is subject to reasonable restrictions.”
It further argues, “All persons will have the right freely to profess, practice and propagate religion and not that all persons will have the right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion. It means the right to profess, practice and propagate religion is free to everyone, but cannot be practised absolutely or freely.”
The plea emphasises that constitutional freedoms cannot be interpreted as absolute rights and must be read in conjunction with “reasonable restrictions” embedded in the constitutional framework. It argues that religious freedom does not extend to acts involving fraud, coercion, or undue influence.
“The expression does not mean that every person is free to do whatever they wish in the name of religion. Rather, it means that everyone has the right freely to profess, practise and propagate, but this freedom itself is subject to reasonable restrictions,” the petition adds.
The petition, filed in connection with an already pending matter, seeks directions to both the Centre and state governments to adopt stricter legal mechanisms to curb what it describes as fraudulent religious conversions. It also demands the creation of special courts to handle such cases and proposes that sentences in such matters should run consecutively rather than concurrently to ensure stricter punishment.
The plea further references judicial observations, noting that in 2023 the Supreme Court had remarked that religious conversion is a sensitive issue that should not be politicised and had sought assistance from Attorney General R. Venkataramani on the matter.
Meanwhile, the petition has gained attention due to its connection with the ongoing TCS Nashik case, where police are investigating multiple FIRs filed by women employees alleging harassment and related misconduct. The case has led to arrests, suspensions, and an ongoing SIT probe.
The Supreme Court is yet to take a final view on the plea, but the matter is expected to raise wider constitutional questions on the limits of religious freedom, the scope of criminal law, and the threshold at which coercive conversion, if proven, may attract the most serious legal classifications.
