BAREILLY: A woman, 20, who left her home in Vadodara, Gujarat and travelled over 1,200km to reach UP’s Pilibhit to get married to a man, 25, will soon be on her way back as police in the UP district have arrested her lover and three clerics who were about to convert her to Islam -- a precursor to Islamic marriage. The arrests were made on the basis of a complaint filed by the village head.
The woman, who was living with her maternal uncle after the death of parents, met the youth, Tasleem Arif, in Vadodara a few years ago. Arif used to work in a factory there. On Sunday, they reached Pilibhit’s Kajri Niranjanpur village.
As the preparations for the wedding were on, a police team reached the village. The woman, the youth and three clerics were taken to Sehramau North police station of Pilibhit. Soon, the four men were booked for kidnapping, even as local police admitted that the woman had come to the village on her own and wanted to get married.
They were booked under IPC sections 366 (abducting woman to compel her marriage), 368 (wrongfully concealing and or keeping in confinement) along with the sections 3 and 5 of the UP’s Prohibition of Unlawful Religious Conversion Ordinance, 2020. All the accused have been arrested.
Local police said that the woman’s maternal uncle will soon come to Pilibhit to take her home.
The complaint was filed by Yadvinder Singh, the village pradhan. Apart from the youth, the three arrested clerics were identified as Aqib, Maulana Rahish and Syed Tareef.
Pilibhit’s superintendent of police (SP) Kirit Kumar Rathod said, “The girl is an adult. But we found violation of law here which is why an FIR has been registered under relevant sections. The woman will be produced before a magistrate court tomorrow where she will give her statement. The accused have not been sent to jail and further action will be taken on the basis of the woman's statement in the court."
