Politics
MP: Hindu Woman Accuses Muslim Classmate Of Stalking Her, Forcing Her To Convert To Islam And Marry Him
- The Madhya Pradesh Police have arrested the accused for stalking and harassment, but not forced conversion.
The victim and the accused.
A college student in Madhya Pradesh, a Hindu, has accused a Muslim classmate of stalking and molesting her, and forcing her to convert to Islam and marry her.
He has been arrested.
The incident has taken place in Shujalpur city that falls under Shajapur district, located in the northwestern part of the state. The region is near the Ratlam-Ujjain area.
What The FIR Says
The first information report or FIR (number 148/2022) in the case was registered at Shujalpur Mandi Police Station on 18 April.
This is what the victim, Priyanka Patidar, a resident of Jamner village of Shujalpur city, told the police in her written complaint:
She has recently completed her school and got admission in a paramedical course at Jash Hospital in Shujalpur. She takes a bus from Jamner to reach Shujalpur daily.
For the past five or six months, one of her classmates named Sameer Mansuri has been following her with an intent of having a love affair with her. When she ignored him, he began threatening her, saying he would share her morphed pictures on the internet. He even threatened her of an acid attack.
Sameer told he loved her and wanted to marry her. He even asked her to convert to Islam for that reason. Afraid of him, she never dared to share this with her parents.
One day when she was entering her classroom, Sameer stopped her by holding her hand. He asked her why she was not talking to him. He asked her to go with him. When she refused, he told he will make her pictures go viral on the internet.
Sameer had her name tattooed on his hand. He told he had hacked her Instagram account.
Fed up with his threats, Priyanka went to Jhonkar (300 kilometres from Jamner) at her maternal uncle's house where she told him everything.
After listenining to her, Priyanka’s maternal uncle Arjun Patidar took her to a police station and gave a complaint.
Based on the complaint, the police booked Sameer under various IPC sections 341 (wrongful restraint), 354 (assault or criminal force to a woman), 354 (a) (1) (i) (physical contact involving unwelcome and explicit sexual overtures), 354(d) (attempts to contact any women without her interest), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 509 (insult modesty of a woman).
What The Police Say
Shujalpur Mandi Police Station in-charge Santosh Waghela told this correspondent that the accused, Sameer Mansoori, was arrested a day after the FIR was registered. He said Sameer was arrested from Narsingarh Tehsil of Rajgarh district in Madhya Pradesh. He was presented before the court on 19 April after which he was sent to judicial custody.
The officer said the victim went through the mandatory medical checkup to ascertain physical assault a day after the FIR. She recorded her statement in front of the court under section 164 of the CrPC the same day, that is on 19 April.
Sameer is a resident of Bhilkhedi Road in Shujalpur, the officer said.
What The Victim Says
This correspondent contacted Arjun Patidar, maternal uncle of the victim, who took her to the police station.
He said the family wishes to stay away from media as “we hail from a reputed family in Shujalpur”.
Arjun said that his niece Priyanka often visits his house in Jhonkar during her vacations. “She is a happy girl, perhaps the most pampered in the family,” he said.
“She is usually very cheerful. This time, she was unusually quiet. When I pressed her for the reason, she divulged all the details,” he said.
Arjun said he was in touch with some Hindu activists in the area. He took the matter to them and, together, they went to the police station to give the complaint.
Arjun made this correspondent talk to Priyanka, but requested to keep the conversation brief.
In a thin voice, the girl said, “Hello didi, namaste.”
This correspondent began by asking her about her studies, to which she said that she had been skipping her classes due to Sameer and would rejoin the college soon. Her exams were around, she said.
Her father works at a private firm while mother is a homemaker. She has a younger sister and a younger brother, both in school.
Cautiously, Priyanka revealed these details: she said Sameer was a classmate in her college, who she had never interacted with, but he began to follow her on her way to college.
She said Sameer used to sit on the last bench, wore different shoes than the uniform and mostly came late to the class.
“For the past five or six months, since the classes resumed, he has been following me. Even when I went to the washroom, he followed me. The whole class knew he stalked me,” she said.
“One day, I confronted him and asked him what his problem was. He said 'tumse mohobbat hai’. I did not even know his name then,” she says.
While Priyanka could not gather the courage to rebuke him and went away, Sameer only grew more aggressive.
He began to pass signs such as flying kisses, winking eyes and licking his finger. “Didi, his gestures were so bad that I could not even complain to the college authorities. He would lift his shirt up to show me his stomach.”
A petrified Priyanka had no clue how to deal with Sameer. When she revealed it to a woman friend, the latter suggested that Priyanka must not escalate the issue else Sameer could get even more aggressive.
Priyanka says that one day, Sameer stopped her on her way to the class and asked her why she was not talking to him and ignoring all his efforts. When Priyanka tried to escape, he held her hand and said, “Pyaar karta hu tujhse, dekh tera naam, mujhse nikah karle or Islam me aaja. Tujhe Rani banake rakhunga [I love you. See your name tattooed on my hand. Marry me and come to Islam. I will treat you like a queen],” he told her.
When Priyanka did not respond and went away, Sameer told her, later, that he would throw acid at her if she did not accept his proposal.
Priyanka said her friend was the only person she revealed this to, but the latter always suggested her to keep mum about it, fearing for her safety.
One day, Sameer told he wanted to take her out. When she refused, he told her that had access to her Instagram account, and he would download all the pictures, morph them to look obscene and circulate on various social media accounts. “He told me I would not be able to show my face to anyone. He said nobody will be able to make out that the pictures are morphed. He said my life will become hell if she ignored him further,” said Priyanka.
Sameer would also tell her than he was “Kabir Singh” of the collage and Priyanka was her “Preeti”, referring to a Bollywood film about a stalker named Kabir Singh, played by actor Shahid Kapoor.
Asked if he managed to convince her to go somewhere with him, Priyanka said no.
In a low voice, she said that Sameer tried to touch her upper body and hips on an occasion when she was on her way to the washroom. “He was just not scared of anything,” she says.
“He once wrote my name on his arm using a blade and showed it to me.”
Asked if she ever revealed this to the staff at college, Priyanka said she did not as she feared repercussions from Sameer.
Priyanka said she belongs to a “simple family”, and her father spends all his earnings on education of the three children. Priyanka said she wanted to supplement the family income after completion of her course.
She said that she got a mobile phone only during the lockdown, in order to attend online classes. When Sameer said he has hacked my Instagram account, I immediately logged out of all social media applications.
Watch the statement of the victim, given to a media house here.
Swarajya has been bringing you many cases where Muslim men target non-Muslim women for love affairs in order to convert them to Islam in order for fulfilling the mandate of “Dawah” (invitation to Islam). Many such cases end up in trafficking and sexual harassment of women, including minors, and even murders of women for resisting. The pattern is similar to targetting of Hindu, Christian and Sikh women in Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Read some cases here:
