The curious cases of ‘love jihad’

In times of yore, those who struggled against the oppression of British rule, once envisioned a dream where the people of the subcontinent lived together in peace and harmony. More than half a century down the road, the visions of a peaceful land remain unrealised. In the last half decade or so, an unusual form of conflict termed ‘love jihad,’ has been garnering controversy in India, wherein young Muslim men are accused of professing false sentiments of love and affection in order to seduce girls from other communities to renounce their faith and convert to Islam.

More often than not, investigations into alleged occurrences of ‘love jihad’ have proved they are nothing more than conspiracy theories propagated against interfaith couples who marry against their families’ will. As early as 2010, the Karnataka state government reported to the Karnataka High Court that no organised attempt was being made to force religious conversion. In January 2012, the Kerala police declared love jihad “a campaign with no substance”, and after renewed controversies in 2014, Reuters reported it to be baseless — “an absurd conspiracy theory by mainstream, moderate Indians”.

In the most recent case, a prominent Indian news agency reported that a right-wing group had issued a dictate barring the entry of Muslim youths at a religious festival in Mandvi, India. The professed aim of the Hindu Yuva Sangthan was to protect their womenfolk from being seduced away from their faith. When asked how they intended to identify non-Hindus, the president of the organisation replied, “We can identify such elements.”

Such discrimination sets up the stage for potentially dangerous situations, where emotionally charged mobs can cause loss of life and property when convinced that they have found intruders in their midst. Such occurrences may set the stage for violent protests and communal backlash, making interfaith relations increasingly fraught with tension. In many such cases of forceful conversion, the alleged victims have often come forward of their own accord and professed that they have voluntarily converted to the religion of their spouse, in defiance against the will of their families. In October 2014, a woman who had claimed to be gang-raped and forcefully converted to Islam, retracted her statement and instead confessed to eloping with the accused, having previously given an incorrect statement at the coercion of her family.

Cases involving conversions to other faiths for love should not be used to create strife and disharmony. It is in the interest of human preservation to use these occurrences as the convergence of communities. Such unions should be celebrated as beacons of interfaith harmony — evidence that our communities, despite their violent and blood-soaked past, can indeed lay aside their differences.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 17^th, 2015.