Karnataka

Bangalore police investigate "love jihad" pamphlets

Written by : TNM

The news Minute | October 28, 2014 | 3.23 pm ISTBangalore police are “informally investigating” leaflets asking Muslims to convert girls of other faiths to Islam, that appear to be doing the rounds in the city.The News Minute has access to a copy of the leaflets, in which “the students of Muslim Youth Forum give a call” to “bring more and more non-Muslim girls” to the faith of Islam. There leaflets do not contain any indication of where they come from or when they were published. The leaflet contains a “cash reward list” offering varying amounts of cash for girls from different communities, namely: Hindu (Brahmin girl), Hindu (Kshatriya girl), Hindu (OBC, SC, ST), Jain, Gujarati (Brahmin girl), Gujarati (Katchi girl), Sikh (Punjabi girl), Punjabi Hindu girl, Christian (Roman Catholic), Christian (protestant), Buddhist girl.For contact information, the addresses of the Popular Front of India offices in Bangalore, Chennai, and Karnataka are listed. The phone numbers however, include both landlines and what appear to be 10-digit mobile numbers with the international code 92, which is Pakistan’s code.Additional Commissioner of Police Alok Kumar told The News Minute that the matter had come to their attention, but that they were “investigating informally”. He said that no one had come forward to lodge a complaint. Karnataka State president of the PFI Abdul Wahid Sait told The News Minute that they had found these images circulating in WhatsApp groups and email, and had brought the matter to the police in the first week of October, but had not yet lodged a formal complaint, as they did not have a “hard copy” of the complaint. Asked if the cyber crime cell, which is handling the case, had asked them for a hard copy of the leaflet, he said they had not, but were planning to lodge a formal complaint with the police.Asked if the PFI had anything to do with the pamphlets, he said “absolutely not”, adding that it appeared like well-calculated attempt. "Love jihad is just a stupid phrase coined by groups, who want people to hit the panic button without reason."Citing the case of a Christian woman in Mangalore, Sait said: “We don’t have a policy on love. If it is pure love, we don’t get involved. But if there is a victim, if there is coercion then we would get involved. It is wrong to say that we are associated only with one religion. (PFI) staged a protest in Mangalore.” A Christian woman in Mangalore, Dakshina Kannada district, had recently lodged a complaint with the Konaje police alleging that she had forced her to change her religion to Hinduism and marry a Hindu man. Police have registered a case of rape and kidnap and are investigating the case. Claims of organized attempts by Muslims to lure Hindu women first began cropping up in the geographically contiguous region of coastal Karnataka and northern Kerala. After repeated claims of "love jihad" by right-wing organizations, the police of both states were asked to investigate. Police in Kerala and Karnataka have submitted reports to their respective High Courts stating that there was no organized attempt to lure women into marriage and then convert them to another religion.

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