The Delhi High Court on Thursday directed the Delhi Police to provide protection to a woman who converted her religion from Hinduism to Islam alleging she and her family members constantly being targeted by state officials and media persons. The matter come up for heating before the vacation bench of Justice C Hari Shankar who has listed the matter before the regular bench for July 5, 2021 has directed the Delhi Police to provide her protection till the matter be heard by the regular bench.
The petitioner seeks direction against the Commissioner of Police, the SHO (Police Jamia Nagar), the Government of NCT of Delhi, the Director General of Police (Uttar Pradesh) and the State of Uttar Pradesh.
The petition has been filed by Renu Gangwar now Ayesha Alvi through Advocates Kamlesh Kumar Mishra and Nitin Kumar Nayak alleging that she has constantly getting extreme threats to her life and her family members are being witch hunted by the officials of the Uttar Pradesh Police as also by the media channels and the vigilant groups.
The petitioner who originally belonged from the Tilhar, Shahjahanpur, Uttar Pradesh, is working and residing in Delhi. She states that she is an adult and is protected by the constitution to choose her own faith and she cannot be targeted and harassed for the choice she makes with regard to the religion she follows. She stated that on May 27, 2021, she had converted to Islam with her own free will and without any threat or coercion from anyone.
The petition inter-alia prays for orders directing the media channels (Including electronic media, print media and visual media) to not to publish any malicious content with regard to the petitioner and not to divulge her personal details and if already done the same may be removed with immediate effect.
The plea states, “Owing to her conversion of religion she and her family is being targeted and malicious contents about her is being published in the media everyday which seeks to be immediately stopped.”
The plea further states that certain media persons entered her house against her wishes and took her photos and videos. It is further stated that the said media persons threatened to leak her photos and demanded money in order to not leak the said photos.
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The plea states that several news reports appeared in the small time newspapers and news portals in UP with regard to the conversion of the petitioner giving completely absurd and imaginary details.
The petitioner also preferred a complaint to the commissioner of police on the 24th of June 2021. The plea states that no action has yet been taken on the complaint made by her and hence the present petition is being preferred.