Prayagraj: The Allahabad High Court has refused to quash a first information report (FIR) lodged against two Class 12 students accused and booked under the Uttar Pradesh anti-conversion law for allegedly forcing their classmate to wear a burqa and attempting to convert her to Islam.
Dismissing the petition, a bench comprising justices JJ Munir and Tarun Saxena also took note of the ‘disturbing trend’ of young people ‘thrusting’ their religion/belief upon others, a tendency sought to be curbed by the UP Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021.
“We must be alive to the situation that the Act of 2021 was enacted to curtail an emergent situation in society where certain persons go about not professing or propagating their religion, but thrusting it upon others in the belief which somehow makes it to their mind the religion they believe in must be followed by others.”
‘More disturbing if trend seen among youth’
“If this kind of a trend comes to be seen amongst young people, it is all the more disturbing. This is time in their lives when they should be thinking more towards developing their skills in different fields of education and dedicate themselves in the service of the society and the nation. The Act of 2021 was brought to curtail this emerging problem, which is heard from different quarters in the country these days, and of which we must take judicial notice,” the court added.
The court on Thursday, April 16, said, “A statute that is enacted to curtail an emergent mischief, if stopped in its tracks at the very early stages of its enforcement, would bog down the statute and frustrate its purpose.”
“This does not mean that false implications under a new statute are to be encouraged, but, at the same time, the purpose, for which the statute has been enacted, cannot be subverted by snuffing out prosecutions brought on tangible materials at the threshold.”
Victim ‘brainwashed to the extent that she lost ability to think’
The FIR was lodged by the brother of the student in Moradabad that his sister was being compelled by her five Muslim classmates, including the petitioners (Aleena and Shabiya, both major), at a local tuition centre to wear a veil (burqa) and embrace Islam.
In her statements recorded under Sections 180 and 183 Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), the victim referred to a specific incident from December 2025 wherein the five girls brought a veil and made her wear it.
The victim further alleged that these classmates would bring non-vegetarian food and allure her to eat the gravy when she refused the meat. She also alleged that one of them (Aleena) even brainwashed her to the extent that she lost her ability to think. It was also alleged that they would repeatedly tell her that their religion was good, that the Quran could be read in 40 days and that wearing a burqa offered the freedom to go anywhere.
It was submitted on behalf of the petitioner that the impugned FIR carried general and omnibus allegations of conversion against the petitioner. The petitioner is an 18-year-old girl who had to write her Class 12 examinations and is currently unable to concentrate on her studies on account of the distraction due to this FIR.
Lastly, it was submitted that the thrust of the allegations is against the co-accused, who has not pressed the petition, and not against the petitioner (Shabiya) in this matter or the others.
In its 11-page judgment, the court noted that in the case diary, the victim was caught on a CCTV camera, located in an alley, where she was seen being forced to wear the burqa by the petitioner and the other co-accused.
The court also found that the case diary contained “lots of material” collected during the investigation, which, prima facie, disclosed a case requiring thorough investigation.
The court added that whether the petitioners’ acts constitute allurement or undue influence as punishable under the 2021 Act is a question premature to be examined in a petition to quash the FIR.
In the totality of circumstances, the court refused to quash the impugned FIR.
