Allahabad High Court refuses to quash FIR in Moradabad ‘burqa’ conversion case against two students
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The Allahabad High Court has declined to quash an FIR against two Class 12 students accused under Uttar Pradesh's anti-conversion law for allegedly pressuring a Hindu classmate to wear a burqa and convert in Moradabad. Calling the trend among young people "all the more disturbing", a division bench of Justices J J Munir and Tarun Saxena also vacated a February stay on one girl's arrest.
The case stems from January, when a video surfaced on social media showing five Muslim girls—four minors aged 16-18 and one 20-year-old—allegedly forcing the sole Hindu girl in their tuition group to don a burqa en route home. The girl's brother filed a complaint, leading police to register an FIR under sections 3 and 5(1) of the 2021 Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, which bans conversions through force, coercion, allurement, or undue influence.
The bench emphasised the Act's purpose in curbing an "emergent mischief" of thrusting religion on others, noting that youth should focus on education and nation-building instead. Dismissing defence claims of a "concocted" revenge plot—alleging the complainant's brother had proposed to one accused and faced college complaints—the court found the victim's magistrate statement credible. She detailed being coerced into wearing a burqa at a hotel on 20 December, eating non-vegetarian food, and facing brainwashing to adopt Islam, corroborated by CCTV footage.
The judges rejected arguments of vague allegations or mala fide intent, stating such claims lacked record support and that probing "allurement or undue influence" was for investigation, not a quashing petition. "This does not mean that false implications under a new statute are to be encouraged," they observed, "but, at the same time, the purpose for which the statute has been enacted cannot be subverted by snuffing out prosecutions brought on tangible materials at the threshold." Both petitions were dismissed on Thursday.