Over 200 people from 57 Muslim families, who were “converted” to Hinduism in a Bajrang Dal exercise in Agra, said Tuesday they were give the wrong impression about the programme.
They were informed that the programme was for registering them as BPL families, and not for religious conversion.
The families confessed that they were “changing their religion” with their own volition out of fear of violence.
As the conversion programme had happened “out in the open”, and the families had changed tack under coercion, expressed the representatives of the Bajrang Dal.
Ismail Khan, the ‘pradhan’ of the 57 families, comprising more than 200 people, said he had first been approached by a man 15 days ago and lured us with incentives like a ration card and aadhaar cards that would entitle them to subsidized welfare schemes. When I said no, he told me he would arrange them for us,” he said
Khan said the man he identified as Kishan Lal. “He said on the day our names were registered, big people would come to our basti, and even the media. I saw no danger in this, and agreed immediately. It was decided, that the event would be held on Monday,” he said.
Men arrived in “big cars with tilaks on their foreheads accompanied by the media. “We began to get worried, but could say nothing for fear of the powerful people.. We are poor people with nowhere to go, and if our landlord tells us to leave, we will have nowhere to go. What could the men have said but yes?” said another resident, Murshida Begum of the slum cluster.
“About 30 years ago, their forefathers had converted to Islam. Now they realise their interests are protected by Hindu religion so they have returned,” said Ajju Chauhan, a Bajrang Dal activist. So, “It was not a conversion but a ghar vapsi, he said.
So far, no official complaint was received by the police and if they did, the matter will be investigated.
Source: Siasat
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