Indian state bans religious conversion before marriage in crackdown on ‘Love Jihad’

Politicians from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party claim Hindu women are being forced to convert to Islam

Credit: Mahesh Hariani/Moment RF

Religious conversion before marriage will be punishable with a 10-year jail sentence in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, a move opposition activists say is the latest attack on India’s historic secularism.

Politicians from the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claim Muslim men are brainwashing Hindu women into converting to Islam before marriage — a practice they have described as “Love Jihad” — and allege it is a wider conspiracy to change the demographics in India.

The authorities in the BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh said the law was necessary as they have documented more than 100 cases of forced conversion in the state.

“The way in which religious conversions are done using deceit, lies, force, and dishonesty is heart-wrenching, and it was necessary to have a law in this regard,” said an Uttar Pradesh government spokesperson.

Similar bills have been tabled in two other BJP-ruled states, Madhya Pradesh and Haryana.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has introduced a string of Islamophobic policies since his re-election in 2019

Credit: Reuters

Uttar Pradesh, home to over 200 million people, may permit religious conversion after marriage but only if an application is submitted to a district magistrate two months in advance and reviewed by a committee.

In reality, forced religious conversions are extremely rare and approximately 80 percent of India’s 1.38 billion citizens remain practicing Hindus.

Last week, five opposition-ruled states condemned the “Love Jihad” laws as an encroachment on personal liberty and an attack on Indian secularism.

The bill is the latest attempt to “divide the nation and disturb communal harmony”, according to Ashok Gehlot, the chief minister of Rajasthan, who belongs to the opposition Congress Party.

The BJP has been accused of implementing a string of Islamophobic policies since Prime Minister Narendra Modi was re-elected with a landslide victory in 2019.

These included the removal of the autonomous status that India’s only Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir has enjoyed since independence and the introduction of a new bill that only offered citizenship to non-Muslim religious minorities fleeing persecution in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh.