Kozhikode: Parents of girl allege love jihad

KOZHIKODE: Parents of a 19-year-old girl who was allegedly forced to convert to Islam after being subjected to sexual abuse and blackmail accuse the police of not acting on their complaint until they approached the Union home ministry and National Minority Commission (NMC).

Mohammed Jasim, 19, a native of Naduvannur who surrendered to the Medical College police on Tuesday, faces charges of rape, extortion, criminal intimidation and attempts to insult religious sentiments and is now in judicial custody.

According to the complaint, he drugged and raped the girl at Sarovaram Bio Park on July 7 and took her nude photos to blackmail into sex again.

He and a gang also allegedly made two attempts to kidnap her from home amid protests from parents and the girl.

She revealed it to the parents after the boy started threatening to share her photographs on social media.

They complained to Nadakkavu police on August 5.

Her father alleged that the boy's relatives are very much influential and that he strongly believed the boy belonged to a Love Jihad group with strong supporters in the state government.

"Filed a month ago, only when the National Investigation Agency (NIA) started inquiries after the NMC intervention, the police arrested him," he told reporters here Wednesday.

His letter to NMC chairman George Kurian ensured the intervention of Union home minister Amit Shah and subsequent NIA intervention.

The parents, strongly feel that the state police will not investigate the case properly, have also moved the High Court demanding an investigation by a national agency.

However, police said that the boy and girl were in a relationship for the last two years which grew into the recent incidents.

The NIA had earlier investigated 11 such cases and found the allegations of so-called Love Jihad baseless.

The Kerala Catholic Bishops Council through its mouthpiece 'Jagratha' had alleged that as many as 4,000 young girls were converted to Islam through Love Jihad.