Joining the league of states like Haryana and Madhya Pradesh, the Uttar Pradesh government is all set to enact a law to curb the rising menace of Muslim men pretending to be Hindu to lure Hindu girls into relationships, a phenomenon known as love jihad. The Home Department of the Uttar Pradesh government today said that a strict law would be introduced in the state against to deal with the cases of love jihad. The Home Department has forwarded a proposal regarding the same to the Department of Law of the state.
“A strict law against ‘love jihad’ will soon be brought in the state. Home Department has sent a proposal to the Department of Law,” a statement issued by the home department on Friday said. Law Minister of the state Brajesh Pathak said, “Such issues were affecting communal harmony in the state which needed to be taken seriously. The government had already planned to take this up as law and the procedure has started.”
“It will be a warning for those to refrain from such acts else they will have to bear strict punishment. We can’t reveal the facts but the government will make a very strict law with high penalty and imprisonment. The draft is being prepared and will soon be available in the public domain. We have taken all the measures and making a law is the only way to deal with it,” the minister added.
Commenting on the matter, Minority Welfare minister Mohsin Raza said, “Now in UP it won’t be possible to deceive girls into changing their religion, like a mission. This is a stern message to those jihadis who are doing such acts. There is full preparation to put these people in jail now.”
Supporting the Allahabad High Court order which invalidated religious conversion just for the sake of marriage, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had warned the miscreants indulging in love jihad by concealing their identities and entrapping girls and women in their relationship.
Haryana to set up a committee for drafting law against love jihad
Haryana Home Minister Ail Vij had announced earlier this week, after holding a meeting with senior officials, that a committee would be set up in the state to draft a stringent law against love jihad. Vij had told that the committee would study the laws of other states. “With the enactment of this law, strict action will be taken against any person who is found indulging in religious conversion by pressuring, tempting someone or is involved in any kind of conspiracy or tries to do so in the name of love”, read his statement.
Vij had said in the Haryana Assembly that the government would be considering the Himachal Pradesh’s law against forced religious conversion called the Freedom of Religion Bill 2019 which was passed last year. The law deals with cases of conversion by force, inducement or through marriages solemnised for the sole purpose of adopting a new religion.
Dharm Swatantrya Bill 2020 in Madhya Pradesh
The Madhya Pradesh government is also planning to introduce a law against love jihad. The government is likely to introduce Dharm Swatantrya (Religious Freedom) Bill 2020 in the next Assembly session. The Bill proposes rigorous imprisonment for a period of 5 years on being found guilty of luring a person through fraud and forcing marriage by religious conversion as told by the state Home Minister Narottam Mishra. In addition to these three states, the state governments of Assam and Karnataka are also planning to enact laws against love jihad.
The state government apparently sprung in action after the brutal murder of a college student named Nikita Tomar in broad daylight by a Muslim man named Tauseef who had been stalking and pressurising her to convert to Islam.
OpIndia has decided to use the term ‘Grooming Jihad‘ in place of ‘Love Jihad’ for the latter term fails to capture the gravity of the Jihad that is being waged by sections of radical Muslims to target non-Muslim women. Non-Muslim women are being groomed to accept their own subjugation at the hands of Muslim men. They are kidnapped, raped, lured, converted to Islam, punished and brainwashed. There is no ‘Love’ in these crimes against humanity. There is no ambiguity that it is a form of Jihad. We believe that the term ‘Grooming Jihad’ is far more appropriate since it encapsulates within itself all categories of crimes that keep women at the centre of this Jihad.
