On Saturday, 3rd June, Maharashtra Deputy CM and Home Minister Devendra Fadnavis said that investigations into missing person complaints have led to the unearthing of a large number of Love Jihad cases in the state.
During a media interaction in Mumbai, Fadnavis said that his government is sensitive about the missing person complaints adding that “the detection rate in such cases was 90 to 95 per cent in the state. Still, I agree that more efforts are required to stop the exploitation of innocent girls.”
The Maharashtra Home Minister further stated that there is nothing objectionable in interfaith marriages, however, many cases have surfaced wherein women have been misled and lured with false promises by either married men or those belonging to the ‘other’ faith and subjected to love jihad. He also reiterated his government’s commitment to tackle the surging cases of love jihad and exploitation of women in the state.
“We found cases where false promises were made or fake identities were used to trap innocent women. In many cases, married men have been found to deceive women. A large number of cases of what is called love jihad have come forward. I have said this earlier as well that we are alert on the love jihad issue and working on a law against it,” Fadnavis stated.
In March this year, during the budget session, Devendra Fadnavis said that the Maharashtra government is studying the laws introduced by various states in this respect. He had said back then that information would be gathered from the various states that had already passed anti-conversion laws.
“This is very serious. So we have taken cognisance of the sentiments of the people. We are studying ‘Love Jihad’ type laws that have been passed by other states and an appropriate decision on bringing such a law in Maharashtra will be taken soon. This law will be within the constitutional framework,” he remarked.
Notably, many BJP-led governments, including Uttar Pradesh, Uttrakhand and Haryana, have constituted laws against ‘Love Jihad’ in their respective states to tackle the problem of forced and illegal conversions of Hindus at the hands of their Muslim partners.