Kerala Woman Alleges She Was Held Captive In Yoga Centre For Marrying Christian

Thiruvananthapuram: A 28-year-old woman has alleged in a police complaint that she was held captive and tortured for 22 days at a yoga centre in Kerala for marrying a Christian man. The Hindu woman has alleged that her family conspired with the man who runs the yoga centre to wrongfully confine her and tried to coerce her into marrying a Hindu man. 

The Ernakulam police has filed a case of illegal detention against members of the woman's family and also against the Yoga and Charitable Trust in Kandanad, where she alleges she was held along with about 65 other women, before she escaped on August 21. The Kerala High Court is likely to hear a petition today filed by her husband. 

"...when I objected and tried to escape from illegal confinement they physically assaulted me and outraged my modesty by tearing my dress...There were such 65 girls illegally detained and tortured and many had complained about sexual abuses," the woman has told the police, detailing how the women allegedly confined at the centre have to use bathrooms that don't have bolts, are forced to wear wet clothes with nowhere to dry them and that many of them have fallen ill. 

Along with other women, she has alleged, she was forced to attend classes where the "evils of Christianity and Islam," were taught. 

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The woman's allegations come even as the Kerala State Women's Commission has said it will approach the Supreme Court to be allowed access to Hadiya, a 25-year-old homeopath who converted to Islam and married a Muslim man. Visitors have been barred at the residence of Hadiya's parents, where she has been since her marriage was annulled by the state's high court. The home is guarded by the police.

Hadiya's marriage was annulled by the court following a petition by her parents. The Supreme Court has allowed the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to probe their allegation that she is a target of "love jihad", which right-wing organisations allege is an Islamist conspiracy to convert Hindu women by having Muslim men court and marry them.

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Shafin Jahan, the husband of Hadiya, who was born Akhila Ashokan, has pleaded to the top court to cancel the NIA investigation.