Are grooming jihad (love jihad) gangs targeting young Hindu boys too? A young man from Palakkad has accused that he was forced to convert to Islam after a Muslim girl pretended to be in love. He had gone to work in Malappuram, where he was trapped in love and converted. The young victim escaped the clutches of religious extremists trying to smuggle him abroad.

Sujith, a native of Chittoor, Palakkad, was a victim of forced religious conversion after being trapped in grooming jihad. The victim from a low-income family had gone to work in a cloth shop in Manjeri, Malappuram. But there, a young woman named Faseela proposed to the 25-year-old man.

At first, Sujith shunned the girl’s advances, but later the young man fell into the trap. Meanwhile, Faseela started using sexually explicit conversations with him. She invited the young man to her hostel room, and they had sexual intercourse. Things soon went downhill from there.

The girl threatened Sujith to leave his religion, convert to Islam, and marry him as a Muslim. When he refused, the grooming jihadi promised she would commit suicide after implicating Sujith. Later, Faseela introduced Sujith to a man she claimed was her brother.

Religious extremists then took Sujith to the notorious religious conversion institution Sathya Sarani in Manjeri. He was forced to give up his job at the textile shop. For three months there, the young man was plied on narcotic drugs. Religious studies and classes continued in his intoxicated state.

Sujith was coerced into Sunnath, the Islamist circumcision ritual. Besides, the Nikah (marriage) of the young man and the girl was also performed at the same religious conversion center. According to Sujith, about 30 men, including young boys of his age, and about 65 women, including pregnant ones, were lodged in Sathya Sarani.

By the time Sujith completed ‘classes’ at Sathya Sarani, the young man’s name was changed to Muhammad Ramzan. This name was updated in all his documents, including his Aadhaar card. The conversion mafia arranged for him a passport saying they had organized a job in some Gulf country. Have radical Islamists started recruiting young Keralite men to join terror outfits again?

Meanwhile, Sujith’s family filed a man missing complaint with the Manjeri police station, informing them they had not seen their son in a while. The conversion mafia shifted Sujith and the girl to another religious study center called Safe Home near Muvattupuzha in Ernakulam district. Here, religious education included radical classes against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Manipulation using narcotic drugs continued here too.

Sujith informed his captors he wanted to return to Malappuram from the Safe Home. They arranged a job in a godown, and he returned to Malappuram.

Meanwhile, he was forced to go to religious studies again. When the young man said, he was uninterested, Faseela, her mother, and conversion mafia members turned to physical abuse and beat Sujith.

Unable to withstand extreme torture, Sujith escaped and returned to Palakkad. But still, the young man is receiving constant threatening calls. Sujith has now filed a complaint with the Meenakshipuram police in Palakkad district. Further details are awaited.