Forced conversion: Bhopal man acquitted as case falls through

In 2025, before the couple could register their marriage, a group of lawyers assaulted Khan, accusing him of forcefully converting the woman to Islam.

Bhopal: A Muslim man, arrested on charges of forced religious conversion, was acquitted a year later, after the prosecution’s case fell through as the woman refused to back the allegations.

Initially neighbours, the two became friends and soon fell in love. They had been dating for a year when they decided to get married. Hailing from different religious backgrounds, the couple knew their relationship could face difficulties and decided to seek protection under the law.

“It was her idea in the first place,” Saiyyad Khan told The Indian Express about their decision to get married. On February 7, 2025, the couple from Narmadapuram, Madhya Pradesh, set out for Bhopal district court. Before they could register their marriage, a group of lawyers allegedly assaulted Khan, accusing him of forcefully converting the woman to Islam.

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According to Khan, her family pressured her into filing a case against him, and he was subsequently arrested under the Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act. However, as each hearing passed, the woman refused to stick to her initial allegations.

After initial complaint, woman turned hostile

The prosecution argued that Khan forced the woman into changing her name to Rehana Khan to convert her to Islam. She agreed to marry him after being persuaded by Khan and went to Bhopal, the prosecution had claimed.

During the trial, the woman did not agree to the prosecution’s case and was even declared hostile, The Indian Express reported.

The court observed that she denied key allegations, including those that he asked her to meet at the bus stand, that she, instead of writing an examination, went to Bhopal, not that Khan convinced her to convert.

She told the court that she had voluntarily left home, and “she herself asked the accused to marry.” She said Khan never told him her name would be changed to Rehana Khan after nikah or that he ever “persuaded, induced, or threatened” her to convert to Islam.

The court noted that both the woman and her mother were unaware of the accused’s alleged statement that he would convert her religion, make her adopt the Muslim religion, and change her name to Rehana, as the prosecution claimed.

The woman’s mother said she went to the court of “her own free will”, and her brother too denied that Khan induced her to take her to Bhopal for religious conversion.

The complainant said the police officers forcibly recorded her statement before the magistrate’s court and took her signature on several papers by pressuring her.

Acquittal as two key witnesses didn’t support prosecution story

After the testimonies, the court held that the two important witnesses, the complainant and her mother, “have not fully supported the prosecution story” and acquitted Khan on September 8.

Khan said he last saw her at court, when she denied allegations against him. “The last time I saw her was in court, when she was defending me. Then, she got married…I was driven away from my home,” he said.

“Local villagers pelted my family with stones. A lot of people stood against us,” Khan said. He lost his job as a machine operator at a factory after the arrest and now lives with his family in his ancestral village.

“I wish to finally move on from this. I am happy with the verdict even though there is a lot of sadness for what I have lost.”