{"id":16330,"date":"2018-09-25T23:24:38","date_gmt":"2018-09-25T23:24:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=16330"},"modified":"2018-09-25T23:24:38","modified_gmt":"2018-09-25T23:24:38","slug":"india-cop-on-video-thrashes-woman-for-relations-with-muslim-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=16330","title":{"rendered":"India: Cop on video thrashes woman for relations with Muslim man"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"body-200771816342556199\" readability=\"133.474076837\">\n<p class=\"speakable\">Three <a class=\"InternalLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/topics\/country\/india.html\">Indian<\/a> police officers were suspended on Tuesday after a <a class=\"InternalLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=RixzoDW4TYI\">video<\/a>, showing one of them thrashing a young woman over her alleged relationship with a Muslim man, went viral.<\/p>\n<p class=\"speakable\">In the video, a woman constable could be seen repeatedly striking the student and berating her for allegedly conducting an interfaith relationship.<\/p>\n<p class=\"speakable\">&#8220;You prefer Muslims when there are so many Hindus around,&#8221; a policeman is heard saying in the video clip.<\/p>\n<p>The woman constable also removes the scarf the woman had used to cover her face.<\/p>\n<p>Indian media said the incident took place on Sunday in Uttar Pradesh state\u2019s Meerut city, located on the outskirts of capital, New Delhi.<\/p>\n<p>The woman and her Muslim friend, both medical students in their twenties, were handed over to the police by members of the far-right Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), local media reported.<\/p>\n<p>Police said the female constable and two other police officials have been suspended and an inquiry ordered into the incident.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Their conduct has led to embarrassment for the UP police,&#8221; a senior police official who did not want to be named, told AFP news agency.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Such behaviour shall never be tolerated,&#8221; the Uttar Pradesh police wrote on Twitter amid outrage over the incident.<\/p>\n<h2>&#8216;Love jihad&#8217;<\/h2>\n<p>Before they were handed over to the police, the VHP men had reportedly barged into the man&#8217;s house, accusing him of conducting &#8220;love jihad&#8221; &#8211; a term used by Hindu groups to claim that Muslim men attempted to lure Hindu women into marriage in order to convert them.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;People can\u2019t be allowed to do anything in society even if the apex court allows adults to choose their partners,&#8221; VHP leader Manish Kumar, who allegedly led the assault on the couple, told Indian newspaper, The Hindustan Times.<\/p>\n<p>The couple was released since there was no complaint from any of their family members about their relationship, local media reports said.<\/p>\n<p>Interfaith relationships are frowned upon in Hindu-majority India, where Muslims constitute about one-fifth of the population.<\/p>\n<p>Rights activists and feminists have accused state institutions of perpetuating a &#8220;patriarchal and Islamophobic&#8221; narrative pushed by far-right Hindu groups.<\/p>\n<p>In June, an interfaith couple was <a class=\"InternalLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2018\/06\/official-humiliates-indian-interfaith-couple-sparking-outrage-180622121637579.html\">harassed by an Indian passport official<\/a>, spurring massive outrage.<\/p>\n<p>Months before that incident, India\u2019s Supreme Court had upheld a controversial marriage between a Muslim man and a Hindu girl, who had <a class=\"InternalLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/indepth\/features\/2017\/11\/hadiya-case-fight-woman-marry-man-choice-171128110916513.html\">convereted to Islam<\/a> before tying the knot.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The federal National Investigation Agency had argued during in court that the marriage, which made national headlines for months, was an example of &#8220;love jihad&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><span>But the court, in its ruling, underlined an adult\u2019s right to marry by choice.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div readability=\"32\">\n<p>\n            SOURCE: <span>Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Three Indian police officers were suspended on Tuesday after a video, showing one of them thrashing a young woman over her alleged relationship with a Muslim man, went viral. In the video, a woman constable could be seen repeatedly striking the student and berating her for allegedly conducting an interfaith relationship. &#8220;You prefer Muslims when&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":16331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16330","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16330"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16330\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}