Nagpur Forced Conversion Case Cleric Arrested Rape Blackmail Probe

ce team had been dispatched to Madhya Pradesh to trace the cleric, Hazrat Maulana, who was believed to be hiding in Chhindwara district. However, he had absconded before they reached the location, the police said.

The police will seek the cleric’s custody and interrogate him regarding his alleged role in the case, including the circumstances surrounding the alleged conversion rituals and the involvement of the other accused.

The development comes days after the Nagpur police registered an FIR on June 12 on the complaint of a 24-year-old married woman that she was drugged, assaulted, and blackmailed, and forced into marriage and conversion to another religion. The cleric is accused of participating in the alleged forced conversion.

As per the FIR, he allegedly performed occult rituals on the woman at Tamiya village in Madhya Pradesh and coerced her into accepting Islam and entering into a religious marriage with the prime accused, Ayyaj Taj Madare. The FIR adds that Maulana performed “black magic” on her, and under its influence, she agreed to accept Islam and have a nikah with Madare.

With Maulana’s arrest, all three accused named in the case, including Madare, 26, and accomplice Aamin Sheikh, 30, are now in police custody.

The FIR was lodged under sections 64 (rape), 308 (extortion), 296 (obscene acts and songs), 351(3) (criminal intimidation), and 61 (criminal conspiracy) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, along with sections of the Maharashtra Prevention and Eradication of Human Sacrifice and other Inhuman, Evil and Aghori Practices and Black Magic Act, 2013.