Right-wing groups in Karnataka have recently stirred controversy after a 20-year-old Hindu woman, a BCA student from Mangaluru, left her home to be with Muhammad Ashfaq, a Muslim man from Kasaragod, Kerala. The woman, who was living with a relative in Ullal, reportedly left on June 30 to be with Ashfaq.
Her father filed a complaint with Vidyanagar police, alleging that his daughter had been kidnapped by Ashfaq and was being forced to convert to Islam. He also appealed to the Mangaluru Police Commissioner and sought assistance from the right-wing group Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP).
Police tracked the couple to Kerala and brought the woman back to Mangaluru, placing her in a counseling center in Mudipu. Mangaluru Police Commissioner Anupam Agrawal stated that the woman left home willingly and was not abducted. “A missing complaint was filed by the woman’s father. No case under the anti-conversion law was registered,” he said.
Some news reports alleged that Ashfaq had multiple cases against him. VHP leader Sharan Pumpwell and other Hindutva leaders labeled the incident as a case of ‘love jihad,’ a term used by right-wing groups to accuse Muslim men of luring Hindu and Christian women into marriage and forcing them to convert to Islam.
In 2023, the Karnataka Cabinet decided to repeal the anti-conversion law passed by the previous BJP government. Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs HK Patil announced this decision on June 15, 2023. The Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Act, 2022, faced significant criticism for being more stringent than similar laws in other states.