Dilshad Hussain, who was out on bail in a rape case, was shot dead at the gate of the civil court in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, on the afternoon of Friday (January 21, 2022) by the father of a minor girl he had allegedly raped. After this, it is being peddled by the left-wing media that Dilshad had converted to Hinduism for that girl and married her, and it is a matter of consent between two ‘adults’. However, the truth of the deceased Dilshad Hussain, a resident of Vidhipur under Sakra police station area of Muzaffarpur district of Bihar, is different.
OpIndia contacted Arya Samaj Mandir in Hyderabad, where Dilshad married the girl, to inquire about it. The said Arya Samaj temple is located in the ‘Chengicherla’ area of Hyderabad. Sharing pictures of this wedding on social media, some people claimed that Dilshad had adopted the Hindu religion and had done everything according to Hindu customs. Media organizations like ‘Lallantop’ and ‘Janjwar’ propagated this narrative. So did Dilshad leave Islam and convert to Hinduism? Yes and No.
Dilshad had indeed got ‘converted’ to Hinduism and was also given a Hindu name at the Arya Samaj Mandir. But all this was only for marrying the Hindu girl. Actually, he had not converted, and he remained a practising Muslim even after his ‘conversion’ to Hinduism. The conversion was only for show, and he didn’t follow it through.
Arya Samaj Mandir of Hyderabad told the details related to Dilshad’s marriage and his so-called conversion
People at Arya Samaj Temple while talking to OpIndia said that they were given the girl’s secondary school certificate of the Uttar Pradesh Board of Secondary Education. Her first year (BA) certificate of graduation from Veer Bahadur Singh Purvanchal University located in Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh was also submitted. They also informed that in the Aadhar card given by the girl as identity proof, her date of birth is mentioned as December 5, 1998. Accordingly, they were told that the girl was an adult and was 21 years old.
Dilshad had submitted copies of his Aadhar card and PAN card as his identity for marriage. It was told on behalf of the Arya Samaj Mandir Hyderabad that the policemen had come to Telangana, from where they had taken the boy and the girl. They told that, in the temple, the girl was asked questions about love and marriage, for example, do your parents agree with you, how did you fall in love, where did you meet, etc. The video of this conversation is still available with the temple.
Panditji told that marriage is done in the Arya Samaj temple only after giving complete confirmation. However, he said that as Dilshad has been murdered, and as the matter is going on in the court, he may also have to face legal issues if this video goes viral. He also said that he is ready to cooperate if he is summoned and questioned. He told that a few days ago, Dilshad had also come to him.
Panditji had then told Dilshad, “If you have been married according to Hindu customs and the boy and girl are adults as well as agree, then these certificates should have been given to the court.” Dilshad’s conversion certificate was also made. Panditji also informed that the girl’s father Bhagwat Nishad had submitted the birth certificate of his daughter and he had told the police/court that she is a minor.
The priest of the temple, Pandit Ganesh Kumar Shastri says that the marriage was allowed only after Dilshad converted to Hinduism. He said that according to the documents handed over to him, the girl is an adult. He also came to know only from the newspaper that Dilshad was shot by Bhagwat Nishad, the girl’s father. Dilshad had come to the temple about two months ago to take pictures. The date of February 13, 2020, is written in the certificate of conversion. After his conversion, his name was changed to ‘Dilraj’.
Dilshad’s father’s name is Tahir Hussain. His date of birth was given as January 1, 1991. Accordingly, his age became 31 years. It is clear from these things that Dilshad had changed his name to ‘Dilraj’ after converting to Hinduism, but all this was done only for the marriage, and he had not become a practising Hindu. In fact, he continued to be a Muslim in his real life even after his ‘conversion’ to Hinduism. On social media, he had kept his name ‘Dilshad Hussain Dilraj’, he had retained his Muslim identity.
Dilshad remained a Muslim despite converting to Hindu for marriage
After the death of Dilshad, his last rites were performed according to Islamic customs in village Vidhipur. The people of the village have confirmed this. The question is if he had become a Hindu, he would have been cremated, whereas this did not happen. He was buried as per Islamic traditions.
Moreover, Dilshad had offered Eid Namaz after he was released on bail. Mohammad Rauf, a villager from Dilshad’s villages, said that after coming back from jail on bail, he had offered Namaz on Eid. It is clear from this that he did not become a Hindu and was a Muslim.
Gorakhpur court Bar Association president Bhanu Pratap Pandey and local journalist Dharmendra Mishra say that Dilshad Hussain only pretended to be a Hindu. That is, they believe that in reality he did not convert and he remained a Muslim. Dilshad Hussain was being prosecuted under the ‘Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses Act, 2012 (POCSO)’. Despite this, he managed to get bail from the court.
Appealing for bail, advocate Arvind Mishra (who presented the case on his behalf) argued that his client is innocent and he has been wrongly implicated with some other motive. Also, the girl’s statement was mentioned that she had physical relations with Dilshad Hussain with her consent and that she is an adult. The girl was quoted as saying that she wants to live with the accused and he has not done any action against her forcingly.
The lawyer had also argued that there was no criminal history against Dilshad Hussain. Whereas the president of Gorakhpur Bar says that he used to run his puncture shop at the door of a Nishad family and he took away the minor girl. He told that Dilshad Hussain used to make negative comments from his Facebook handle, due to which the girl’s father murdered him in a fit of rage. Dharmendra Mishra, a local journalist of Dainik Jagran’s legal affairs beat, said that for the sake of marriage, he used conversion as a medium and changed his name to Hindu, but he was a Muslim and did not accept Hinduism.
He says that his activities were overall Muslim. Bhagwat Nishad’s son Deepak also said that Dilshad Hussain was still a Muslim. Deepak informed that Dilshad Hussain was also troubling Deepak’s family members a lot. He used to make phone calls and make threats and talk nonsense and abuse. Dilshad Hussain’s lawyer Shankar Sharan Shukla said that the family members of the youth have said that the ongoing case between them is also the reason for this enmity.
He said that the evidence that Dilshad Hussain had converted to Hinduism and then married, should be prima facie held to be correct and it was also presented while filing an appeal in the High Court. However, he did not comment when asked about Dilshad Hussain being buried in an Islamic manner after his death. On the question of the girl is a minor, he said that these things are told by all the parties in their own way, and in such cases, the prosecution claims the girl to be the minor and the defence claims her to be the adult.
Now the question arises did Dilshad Hussain cheat the Arya Samaj Mandir by providing them with the girl’s fake Aadhar card. Because in the Aadhar card that has come to OpIndia, it is clearly visible that her date of birth is December 21, 2002.
According to this, she is now 19 years old, while her age at the time of marriage (13 February 2020) would have been only 17 years. She still had 10 months to become an adult. The Inspector of Gorakhpur cant Police Station is also the ‘Investigation Officer (IO)’ in this case. He said that when Dilshad Hussain ran away with the girl, she was a minor. In this murder case, the girl’s father Bhagwat Nishad has been arrested by the police. At that time the police had no information regarding the boy’s conversion to Hinduism.
Funeral was done by Islamic customs: Villagers and family also confirmed
Hrithik Patel, a childhood friend of Dilshad Hussain, who lives in Vidhipur, Muzaffarpur, Bihar, said that Dilshad Hussain was buried in the village graveyard. There is also a separate graveyard for Muslims in the village itself. He told that being Hindu, he did not go to the funeral. While the father of the deceased says that his son had married an adult girl but he was murdered in that enmity. This is what he has written in the FIR of the murder.
Mohd Rauf, the husband of the deputy head of Dilshad’s village, also confirmed that he had been buried in an Islamic manner and had stayed with her family members throughout the process. This process was completed by reciting Fatiha etc. in the ancestral graveyard. He had left the bike at 7 in the morning on the day of his death. After some time his lawyer called and he also left with the family. He alleged that the Gorakhpur police were pressurizing him to return soon after taking the dead body.
Mohammad Rauf says that the houses of both the families were face to face and the boy and girl were friends since childhood and that they had studied together. While Dilshad Hussain’s father Tahir Hussain says that Bhagwat Nishad was his childhood friend and he also talked to Nishad after he was locked up after the murder. He told that he had opened a puncture shop 30 years ago, which was now run by his son Dilshad. He told that the Imam of the village, Mohammad Zahoor Alam, completed the last process of his son by the Islamic process and recited the Fatiha.
Now some more questions arise here. A boy who used to run a puncture shop travels with a girl to Hyderabad and back, posts pictures of living a luxury life on social media, and also get bail from Allahabad High Court in a serious case – what is the source of the funding for all this? Because his father says that he is unemployed and the family does not even have agricultural land. There is still a picture of Mecca-Medina and Kaaba in his village house. After bail, he was living in the village itself.
Dilshad Hussain’s brother lived in Hyderabad and he used to send money to Dilshad Hussain from there. His other brother has done hotel management, but due to loss of memory after an accident, he used to stay at home. Dilshad Hussain’s family says that he never brought the girl to the village.
