On May 18, Wednesday, a 32-year-old Hindu woman named Neetu Yadav was found dead in her house in Prem Nagar Colony in Loni, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. Neetu Yadav had in 2021, become a victim of grooming jihad. The woman had in November 2021 filed a police complaint against one Akram Qureshi, accusing him of faking his identity and lying about his marital status in order to enter into a relationship with her. He had also assaulted her while forcing her to convert to Islam and pressurised her to abort her child.
According to a report by Hindi daily Dainik Bhaskar, the grooming jihad victim was found hanging in her flat in Loni’s Prem colony. She used to run a clinic near the house. The police, who reached her house after getting information about the incident from Neetu Yadav’s neighbours, immediately took the body into possession and sent it for post-mortem.
While the police await autopsy reports, it has been said that prima facie it appears to be a case of suicide.
Loni Kotwali SHO Ajay Chaudhary said that no complaint has been filed in the woman’s suicide case. Following receipt of a complaint, further action will be taken.
Swarajya journalist Swati Goel Sharma took to her Twitter handle to Tweet about the unfortunate death of the Hindu woman. She had been in touch with the deceased since Swarajya had covered the story about Neetu Yadav being trapped by Akram Qureshi. The journalist said that though the police have called it a case of suicide she refused to believe that a woman like Neetu Yadav could have killed herself while knowing her daughter (with Akram) had no one other than her. She informed that she had last spoken to the deceased only 20 days before her death.
The case
On January 6, 2021, Swarajya reported how a 31-year-old Hindu woman from western Uttar Pradesh had filed a police complaint, accusing a Muslim man of lying about his marital status, entering into a relationship with her, and forcing her to convert to Islam.
The police filed a first information report (FIR) based on the complaint and charged Akram Qureshi, his wife Rukhsar, and his brother Tanveer with IPC sections 323 (causing hurt), 342 (wrongful confinement), 506 (criminal intimidation), 376 (rape), 467 (forgery), 468 (cheating), 420 (cheating and dishonesty), and 471 (cheating and dishonesty) (using as genuine a forged document). Qureshi was arrested and sent to jail.
In her complaint, the woman, Neetu Yadav, stated that she met Akram in January 2020 when she joined a private nursing home named Rashidiya in Baraut city as a nurse. The duo worked together there.
Akram lied to her about being divorced and trapped her in a love affair. He lured her to get physically involved with him several times since January 2020, on the pretext of marriage. When she became pregnant, Akram, with the support of his wife Rukhsar and brother Tanveer, confined her and began pressuring her to abort the pregnancy and convert to Islam. They also assaulted her.
According to the complaint, Rukhsar hit her in the stomach on November 17th, after which Neetu begged them to leave her, vowing she would move far away from them and abort the pregnancy on her own.
Neetu Yadav on November 18, 2020, approached the police at Baraut police station of Baghpat district and an FIR was filed against Akram. The police apprehended him and sent him to jail.
Neetu, a native of Khekra village of Baghpat, got married in 2012 to a man from her Yadav caste in an alliance arranged by her family. The couple got divorced in 2017. After her divorce, she started living with her parents. A year later, her parents “threw her out of the house”. Neetu began to live in Loni town of Ghaziabad district as she got a part-time nursing job in a local nursing home. She completed her course and, by end of 2019, went to Baraut for a full-time nursing job in Rashidiya on a friend’s suggestion. Neetu Yadav has a son with her first husband and a daughter with Akram.
According to Dainik Bhaskar, Neetu Yadav had earlier too attempted to commit suicide. She had recently gotten married to Manish Gupta, however, the duo had been living separately for some time due to some personal differences. One Iqbal, who lives in the colony, had once taunted Neetu Yadav’s family about her separation, which had infuriated her. They had got into a verbal spat over the issue. Then too Neetu Yadav had tried hanging herself but her family had then saved her.