Express analysed case records since 2018 when Act was introduced: Courts flag gaps in probe, consent of couples, no proof of coercion.

Nearly seven years after the BJP government in Uttarakhand enacted a law to curb “forced religious conversions”, court records show the statute may be falling short of a basic legal test: evidence. Even as arrests continue, judicial scrutiny has often undercut the state’s claim, with all five cases that have gone to full trial ending in acquittals.

That’s the finding of an investigation by The Indian Express into cases registered under the Uttarakhand Freedom of Religion Act (UFRA), based on records obtained by the newspaper under 30 applications filed under the Right to Information Act.

Until last month, 62 cases were registered by the Uttarakhand Police under the UFRA, passed in 2018 by the BJP government and strengthened further under it. Court records of 51 cases obtained from the state’s 13 districts by The Indian Express show that as of September 2025, only five have gone to full trial. All of them have ended in acquittals; at least seven have been dismissed mid-way largely due to complainants turning hostile, lack of corroboration, and failure by the prosecution to establish coercion or inducement.

In the remaining 39 cases, for which the status is known, the accused are out on bail in three-fourths — 11 having obtained it from the Uttarakhand High Court, and one from the Supreme Court. In three cases, bail has been denied, the hearing is awaited in five, while in two cases, the accused had approached the High Court for a stay on the proceedings and the state has been given time to reply. In many cases, bail was granted, an analysis shows, after noting consensual relationships, contradictory statements, or procedural lapses.

Illustrative of the acquittals is the case related to a wedding arranged by two families, with the couple submitting an affidavit that the woman would not convert to Islam. Despite this, Aman Siddiqui alias Aman Chaudhary spent nearly six months in jail under UFRA before the Supreme Court, on May 19, 2025, granted him bail, holding that the state cannot have any objection to the interfaith marriage which had happened of their own volition and with their parents’ consent.

In this case, his wife’s brother had filed the FIR on December 24, 2024, claiming that Chaudhary concealed his identity till the day of the wedding. Chaudhary’s mother is a Hindu and father a Muslim, and the complainant said he was not aware of the latter. Chaudhary secured bail from the Supreme Court, with his counsel pointing out that he had furnished an affidavit saying his wife would not convert, and that the objections had been raised after the wedding.
Chaudhary has also approached the High Court, challenging the entire proceedings pending before the Court of the Additional District Judge, Rudrapur. In July 2025, the High Court stayed the proceedings and sought a reply from the State.
The fraught journey of the law
Introduced in 2018, a year after the BJP came to power in Uttarakhand, the UFRA was tightened first in 2022, with jail terms scaled up, and then in 2025, with prison terms increased further from three to 10 years, going up to 20 years or life in extreme cases. The 2025 amendment has yet to be notified as the Governor returned it to the government to correct “clerical errors”. The Act aims to “provide freedom of religion” by prohibiting religious conversions effected “by misrepresentation, force, undue influence, coercion, allurement or by any fraudulent means or by marriage”.

The number of cases filed under the Act has been on the rise, especially after the 2022 amendment. The largest number of cases was registered in 2023 at 20, followed by 2025, with the number standing at 18 by September.
The Uttarakhand Police declined to comment on the matter despite numerous attempts.
Behind the five acquittals
Of the five cases in which trials were concluded in lower courts, all of which ended in acquittal, two were on complaints by a third party not directly aggrieved by “conversion”. Under the original Act, only the aggrieved person or his parents or brother or sister may lodge a complaint. In cases where they are unable to make a complaint for some reason, a person related to them, by blood, marriage or adoption, may file a complaint.

Of the two cases filed by a third party, in one, the complaint was filed in February 2021 by Sitaram Ranakoti, belonging to one Sainik Samaj Party, in Tehri Garhwal. Ranakoti accused Vinod Kumar of praising Christianity by “criticising” Hinduism and the caste system, over Facebook videos.
The prosecution produced 13 witnesses, and examined digital evidence and material exhibits, including videos purportedly showing Kumar burning his birth charts.
However, during cross-examination, the Investigating Officer stated that no evidence had emerged showing that Kumar offered any person money as an inducement for conversion. Even the digital evidence did not hold up in court, as the videos were not verified.

Under UFRA, this was a textbook case, as the court upheld the fundamental right to religion when acquitting Kumar in January 2024. “Every person is free to profess, practise and propagate any religion, so long as in doing so they do not infringe upon the civil rights or any legal rights of another person,” it observed.
A second case that ended in acquittal, in which the complaint was registered by a third party, involved charges brought against pastor Narendra Singh Bisht and his wife in Nainital’s Ramnagar in October 2021, by the Antarrashtriya Hindu Parishad. Members of the organisation tore posters with Bible verses and vandalised Bisht’s house, apart from assaulting the gathering, alleging mass conversions.
In the FIR, Bisht was accused of “propagating Christianity and offering inducements for religious conversion… particularly (among) poor persons and members of the Scheduled Tribe community”.

On September 17, 2025, Bisht was acquitted, with the trial court saying the prosecution had failed to establish when and how Bisht allegedly induced any person to convert. Bisht, who spent seven days in prison, told The Indian Express: “After the arrest, it became difficult to live in the same house… We moved 15 km away from the village… It was a long battle, but we won in the end.”
Another case that ended in an acquittal was registered in July 2023, in Almora’s Ranikhet, on charges of conversion through coercion, rape and kidnapping, on the complaint of a man whose wife had gone missing.
The complainant initially filed a missing person complaint, to which Sections of criminal intimidation and the UFRA were added, after the complainant’s wife, on being found, accused Mohammad Chand of “forcing” her to go with him and of sexual assault.

However, during cross-examination, the woman said that she had gone with Chand wilfully and denied any sexual relations between them during this period, refusing to undergo any medical examination. In its observations, the court noted the fact that she had also bought clothes before she left, indicating premeditated departure.
In March 2025, the trial court acquitted Chand of all charges, calling the claims of sexual assault hearsay and saying police had failed to prove kidnapping, rape and criminal intimidation, or forced conversion.
The fourth case resulting in an acquittal was of a kidnapping, following a marriage, registered in Almora in 2023. During cross-examination, the complainant said he never alleged that his sister had been kidnapped and forcibly converted, as attributed in the FIR to him. The sister too testified that there was no intent to convert as alleged, and said she had married the accused as per Hindu rites. She also said she had not given any statement to the police to the contrary.

Since the charges could not be corroborated, the accused was acquitted.
The fifth acquittal was in a case lodged in Ramnagar, Nainital, in November 2022, where a minor’s father alleged she had been coerced to convert. Though the minor submitted a statement backing this, she could not give a date or time for the offence. The witnesses, her father and her landlady could not corroborate the claims either, leading the court to say that these could be considered hearsay.
After the accused was acquitted, the state filed an appeal, but the Additional District and Sessions Judge upheld the trial court judgment.

Contradictions & discrepancies

Of 24 cases in which the trial is on and where Sections of rape or kidnapping have been added along with the UFRA, the status of 16 is known. In 10 of these, courts observed or noted in their orders that the couple were in a consensual relationship, while in one, they were found to be friends.
In 11 of these, the alleged victims changed their initial statements, or the court noted irregularities. In one case, the accused side filed a cross-FIR alleging extortion by the woman’s family, while in another, the defence filed a compounding application stating that the alleged victim had sought a compromise, though the court did not quash the case, saying the offences reported were serious.
Of the six FIRs which invited POCSO charges apart from under the UFRA, in half, the court observed that the couple were in a consensual relationship, but the rape sections stood due to the age of the alleged victim.
Seven other cases where trial is on deal with allegations of “deliberate misrepresentation” of identity by Muslim men to “lure” partners into conversion, a matter often raised by the state government.

In four of these cases, the women complainants either contradicted the claim assigned to them, or the court noted irregularities. In the fifth case, the lower court granted bail to the accused. In the sixth case, bail was granted to the accused by the High Court, noting that the victim’s statement had not been recorded before a magistrate and there was no electronic evidence.
In a case from Haridwar’s Kankhal dating back to January 2023, the woman complained she had got married to a man named Rahul nine years ago and had two sons with him, but now realised that he was Muslim. She claimed that when she confronted him, he assaulted her and coerced her into accepting Islam.
In the High Court, the man’s counsel submitted that there was no proof of marriage between the two, but that they were in a relationship. While the woman stuck to her allegations, the court, granting the man bail, said: “The question is whether for 10 years the informant never came to know what the actual religion of the applicant is. This and many more questions would find an answer during the trial… this court is of the view that the applicant deserves to be enlarged on bail.”
In another case, of December 2022, from Ramnagar in Nainital, a woman claimed concealment of identity by a man she was in a relationship with. His counsel noted that they were in a relationship for five years. While the court did not comment on the merits of the case, the order noted that the accused had submitted documents showing that the woman and he had applied for marriage under the Special Marriages Act earlier.
Another ongoing trial is in a case of alleged mass conversion, filed by Uttarkashi VHP leader Virendra Rawat over a Christmas party conducted by a pastor. The complaint was filed a day after the 2022 amendment that raised prison terms under the Act and made bail difficult.
In his bail application, the pastor alleged that VHP members assaulted members of the congregation. The lower court, while denying bail, said “there appears to be no reasonable grounds at this stage” for it.

Pleas for protection
At least four instances involve state action against interfaith couples seeking protection from families.
UFRA provisions require that for any inter-faith marriage involving conversion to be solemnised, an application be filed before the District or Executive Magistrate a month prior to the conversion ceremony, and the priest concerned also present an advance notice to the DM. Additionally, the person who converted should send a declaration to the DM within 60 days of the ceremony, which would then be put up on the notice board till the conversion is confirmed by the authorities.
The first case under these provisions was registered in 2020 in Dehradun, at the Patel Nagar Police Station, against a couple who had applied in the High Court for police protection. The couple were held in violation of the UFRA, however, for the woman having converted before the marriage without informing the DM. The court asked the DM to conduct a probe, and an FIR was registered against the couple, a relative, and the priest concerned.
In 2023, the court quashed the FIR, and the proceedings in the lower court were stopped, closing the trial.
Five cases cite violations as the couple did not allegedly seek permission from authorities – three were lodged on complaints by police, one by the DM and another by the father of a woman. Of these, in four, the couples have been granted relief from arrest.

Source: Indian Express