Hyderabad,UPDATED: 21 Oct 2022 04:13 IST
The girl, who worked in a factory with her older sister, returned home on Aug. 12 when four men allegedly kidnapped her from Fateh Chowk in Hyderabad (Representative photo)
By Press Trust of India: A Hindu girl, reportedly abducted in broad daylight two months ago from the Pakistani city of Hyderabad and forcibly converted to Islam and married to a Muslim man, was sent to a safe house by a court on Thursday.
The court initially disallowed the girl to go with her parents and admitted the marriage certificate prepared by her husband’s lawyer, but after her videos went viral on social media where she was crying and clinging to her mother. after the court’s ruling, the judge ordered that she be sent to a safe house and meet her parents.
The court ordered that her medical examination also be carried out.
The girl, who worked in a factory with her older sister, returned home on August 12 when four men allegedly kidnapped her from Fateh Chowk in Hyderabad.
According to her parents and their lawyer, the girl was forcibly converted to Islam and married to one of the kidnappers.
Although her parents rushed to the police station and insisted that despite being a minor, she would be forcibly converted and married off, the police did not file a case until September, after which police and human rights officials withdrew her from Balochistan province and she was returned to Hyderabad and kept in a shelter while her husband filed a lawsuit against her parents.
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He also filed a medical statement and a marriage certificate with the court, claiming the girl was 19 years old. But her parents told the court on Thursday that she was a minor and that the police were not cooperating with them.
The court initially admitted the marriage certificate, but after outcry on social media when videos were circulated of the girl crying and hugging her mother in court, the judge ordered that she be sent to a safe house and that her medical examination be given. take place.
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He also prevented the alleged husband from contacting the girl or her family until the medical report was confirmed.
The kidnapping and forced conversion of young Hindu girls has become a major problem in the interior of Sindh province, with a large Hindu population in the areas of Thar, Umerkot, Mirpurkhas, Ghotki and Khairpur. Most members of the Hindu community are workers.
ALSO READ | Hindu woman, teenage girls kidnapped, forcibly converted in Pakistan
On July 16, 2019, the issue of abducting and forcibly converting Hindu girls in several districts of Sindh province was raised in the Sindh Assembly, where a resolution was discussed and passed unanimously after it was amended due to objections from certain legislators that it should not be limited only to Hindu girls.
But the bill criminalizing forced religious conversions was rejected later in the meeting. A similar bill was proposed again, but rejected last year.