AGRA: Five members of a Muslim family and two of their friends were booked by the Agra police under the new anti-conversion law for allegedly concealing their identities and coercing a 15-year-old girl from another community to marry in city’s Hariparvat area. Five of them have been arrested by the police and remanded to judicial custody on Saturday.
The student of class IX, who had been missing since June 15, was reportedly found to be "pregnant" when she returned home on July 1. She had also "converted to Islam". The victim’s father told police that a youth who had introduced himself as "Nikki Yadav", whose real name is Kasim Qureshi, had befriended his daughter over phone and had started coming to their house with his mother and sister.
On June 15, the youth’s sisters again came to their house and took the girl with them on pretext of shopping. When the girl did not return home at night, her family started searching for her. They then went to the youth’s house in Dayalbagh and came to know about their real identity.
The minor girl’s father stated in the FIR that family members of the accused told him that his daughter had tied the knot with their son and "had accepted Islam as her religion and her name had been changed".
He claimed that the suspects threatened him that he will not be able to meet his daughter ever, if he informs the police. Fearing for his daughter’s life, he initially remained quiet.
BJP MLA Purshottam Khandelwal said that local residents had contacted him and after hearing their version, he took the family to the police station for registering the FIR.
Police said besides the main accused Kasim Qureshi and his friend Shibu, his father, mother, two sisters and another friend have been remanded to judicial custody.
Talking to TOI, superintendent of police (City) Rohan Botre said that an FIR has been registered against seven persons under sections 363 (kidnapping), 376 (rape), 420 (cheating), 506 (criminal intimidation), 120B (criminal conspiracy) and sections 3, 4 of Pocso Act, besides the state's anti-conversion law. Five of them have been arrested and the main accused and his friend will be nabbed soon, he added.
