How case against Muslim teen accused of ‘love jihad’ fell apart in UP court

On the night of December 14, 2020, Mohammad Saqib’s life was upended.

He had stepped out of his friend’s home in Nasirpur village in Uttar Pradesh’s Bijnor district after a birthday party. Outside, he saw a girl on a bicycle surrounded by a few men. When he walked up to the group to find out what was going on, the men attacked him.

Saqib, a 16-year-old daily wager, did not return home in Kirar Kheri village that night. The next morning, his parents learnt that he had been arrested.

The girl was also 16 and a Dalit. On December 15, her father lodged a first information report against Saqib at the Dhampur police station.

Saqib was 16 too. He was accused of kidnapping and “compelling” the minor “for marriage”. He was also booked under the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Religious Conversion Ordinance, 2020, better known as the state’s “love jihad” law.

“Love jihad” is a conspiracy theory that accuses Muslim men of being part of an organised plot to trick unsuspecting Hindu women into romantic relationships to ultimately convert them to Islam.

Saqib was one of the first men to be booked under the law, 18 days after it was brought in as an ordinance by the Adityanath government.

Five years later, on...

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