At a time when Bihar has a maha-Dalit Chief Minister and incidents of ‘love jehad’ has been hitting headlines across the country, a Dalit woman in Bihar has lodged a police complaint against seven people for harassing her and family for protesting her husband’s conversion to Islam.
A Dalit Ramkishore Ram of Rampur Khurd village in Sitamarhi district of Bihar was recently converted to Islam by a group of villagers. When his wife, Yashoda Devi protested the conversion, she along with her family members was harassed by those villagers.
later, she lodged an FIR with the local Pupri Police Station against seven villagers, including a former village head, Jiaur Rehman under SC/ST (prevention of atrocities Act).
She also sought protection to her and the family members fearing threat to her life from the perpetrators who allegedly have been threatening her with dire consequences.
“The woman has filed the complaint at the local police station against seven people. A probe has been ordered in the matter and security has also been provided to the aggrieved family,” said Sitamarhi SP, Nawal Kishore Singh.
Significantly, Yashoda Devi said that her husband Ramkishore Ram was converted to Islam when she had gone to her parents’ house for two weeks. When she came to know about his conversion to Islam, she said, she returned to the village and confronted her husband and those who had confronted him.
“A lot of social and family problems surfaced after his conversion to Islam. I protested, but was harassed by those who had converted him,” Devi said. Interestingly, she said, Ram asked her and other family members to convert to Islam too “but we all refused and we also told him to live separately”.
She had also demanded financial support to her family from her husband even after his conversion to Islam. “But he declined and even summoned the former mukhia of the village and others to intimidate me and the family,” said Yashoda Devi. The local police officials said that the case has been lodged and the guilty would soon be arrested.