RAJ KUMAR
Ranchi, March 27: The trial in nine-year old case of ‘love jihad’ involving National Rifle Shooter Tara Shahdeo and Ranjit Singh Kohli alias Rakibul Hassan, a businessman, and his mother Kaushalya Rani alias Kausar Parveen besides high court’s the then registrar (vigilance) Mustaq Ahmed is in final stage in the special CBI court in Jharkhand capital.
The case, which had come to light on August 19, 2014 after Shahdeo registered an FIR at Hindpiri police station, was taken over by the Central Bureau of Investigation in 2015. The court framed charges in the case on July 2, 2018. Following framing of charge the CBI produced 26 witnesses and now today the accused has taken time to produce its witnesses.
The court had set a fixed date of April 11 to record the statement of the defence witness in the matter.
Shahdeo, who was only 23-year-old in 2014, stirred a hornet’s nest on August 19 by lodging the FIR. She accused her husband of faith crime and physical assault. The FIR was registered under Section 498A (domestic violence) despite Tara repeatedly insisting that she had been tormented for over a month for conversion into Islam.
Love jihad, a disparaging term coined by orthodox Hindu groups to deplore “sham marriages” being solemnised by people of the minority community to “engineer unlawful conversions”, triggered vehement protests in Jharkhand capital on August 24, 2014. Following protest police sealed two flats rented by Kohli in posh Ranchi neighbourhoods and seized half a dozen vehicles.
Saffron outfits such as the VHP and the Shiv Sena sponsored a bandh in the capital on the issue. The bandh evoked good response. Kohli’s passport was impounded the same day after the police moved a request with the regional passport office in Ranchi.
The court of chief judicial magistrate issued an arrest warrant against Tara’s tormentor and directed the police to prosecute him under two more IPC sections other than 498A. Those were 295A (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting religious beliefs) and 153A (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony).
