Lawyers attack interfaith couple inside Madhya Pradesh court

Bhopal: In Madhya Pradesh, an interfaith couple allegedly got attacked inside a court, The Indian Express reported.

The couple, a Muslim man and a Hindu woman, were at the court to register their marriage, and the attack happened when the Hindu woman, who was wearing a burqa, revealed her name.

Some lawyers demanded the man to produce his Aadhar card, raising the question of love jihad. After finding that he was a Muslim, they assaulted him.

Civil Lines Station House Officer Kamlesh Sahu told The Indian Express that the woman had a Hindu name but was dressed in a burqa, which made the lawyers angry. She belongs to an upper caste family, and both of them were manhandled, the officer said.

Police meanwhile said that they intervened and saved the couple and lodged the woman in a safe house.

Additional superintendent of police Vivek Kumar told TIE that an FIR had been registered against unidentified persons for assaulting the man. The FIR is based on the man’s complaint, and the officer said the police are looking into the role of lawyers. He added that no arrests had been made so far, nor had any counter-complaints been filed by the lawyers against the man.

However, Advocate D S Ojha, the chief of the Rewa Bar Association, claimed that the lawyers were not involved in the alleged assault but were protesting in the court premises over a separate matter related to a proposed legislation.

Earlier this month, an interfaith couple was attacked at a court in Bhopal when they were there to register their marriage. The attackers were allegedly members of Hindutva organisations, and they were accusing the man of love jihad. Following the assault, the man was arrested by the police, accusing him of forcefully converting the woman.

Love Jihad is a Hindutva conspiracy theory in which Muslim men are part of an organised plot to trick Hindu women into romantic relationships to convert them to Islam.