A youth who eloped with a girl has been arrested by the Bengaluru police on charges of converting her to another religion in violation of the newly introduced state anti-conversion law — the Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Act-2022.
The case filed on October 8 at the Yeshwanthpur police station is the first under the newly enacted law that was notified by the state government on September 30.
Two separate cases — one of suspected kidnapping, and another under the anti-conversion law — have been registered against Syed Muheen, 22, of north Bengaluru who allegedly eloped with his neighbour Khushboo Yadav, 18, and converted her to Islam to facilitate their marriage.
Police arrested Muheen on the basis of a complaint filed by the girl’s mother, Deputy Commissioner of Police (North) Vinayak Patil said.
Muheen and Khushboo were neighbours in the B K Nagar area of Yeshwanthpur and were seeing each other for nearly six months. While Muheen worked at a chicken centre in the locality, Kushboo — one of four children in the family of a painter from UP — had dropped out of school and was staying at home.
Initially, on October 6, Khushboo’s mother Gyantidevi Yadav filed a missing complaint for her daughter stating that she is suspected to have eloped with Muheen.
On October 8, Muheen and Khushboo appeared before the police, claiming that they had married. Gyanthidevi then filed a second complaint under the Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Act-2022.
Source: Indian Express
