BHOPAL: More acquittals and less convictions have marked the first five years of Madhya Pradesh’s stringent anti-religious conversion law – which is often dubbed as the ‘anti-Love Jihad’ law of the BJP-ruled central Indian state.
The Dr Mohan Yadav-led government provided in the Vidhan Sabha on Tuesday, the detailed data related to cases which were registered between January 1, 2020 and July 15, 2025 under the MP Freedom of Religion Ordinance 2020 and its successor MP Freedom of Religion Act 2021.
According to the data shared as part of the written reply to the third-time BJP MLA from Khategaon (Dewas) seat Ashish Govind Sharma, as many as 283 cases were registered under various provisions of the anti-religious conversion law and ordinance in the first five and half years (January 1, 2020 and July 15, 2025) across MP.
While 197 or 70% of the registered 283 cases are under trial in different courts, in as many as 86 or 30% cases, the accused have either been acquitted, convicted or the police investigations are still underway.
In out of those 86 cases, the accused have been acquitted in 50 cases or 58% of those cases, while the accused have been convicted and awarded punishments by courts in just seven cases, which is merely seven percent of the 86 cases.
In one case registered in state capital Bhopal, the case ended following the ‘Razinaamaa’ agreement between both sides.
Among the seven cases in which the accused have been convicted, in one case lodged at Nalkheda police station of Agar-Malwa district and a case of Burhanpur district, the trial court awarded life sentence to the convict. In one case of Mandsaur district, which also involved Section 376 IPC (rape), the accused was convicted and sentenced to ten years in jail. Among the four other cases in which the accused were convicted/awarded punishments by the court, two related to Dhar district, one from Vidisha and one from Rewa district.
As per state police sources privy to probe in such cases, lack of evidence to corroborate the prosecution’s facts in the cases and many female victims turning hostile during the course of trial, have led to more acquittals and less convictions in the cases.
“In many cases, during the course of trial in the cases, the female victims stated before the court that they were in consensual relationship with the man of the other religion, they married men from other religion on their volition and were staying with them on their own, bereft of any fear, threat, pressure or enticement,” an informed source told TNIE.
“During the course of trial in some cases where the victims were minor girls, it came to the fore that the families of some victims even got the FIR registered under the anti-religious conversion law due to societal pressures. In many of such cases, the victims and their family members turned hostile before the court, resulting in the acquittal of the accused,” sources added.
In the 283 cases registered till July 15, 2025, as many as 71 victims were girls aged below 18 years.
Maximum cases under the anti-religious conversion law were registered in western and south western MP (Malwa-Nimar region), which is a tribal dominant and communally sensitive region.
A district wise break-up of the 283 cases revealed that Indore reported maximum 74 or 26% of all cases, while state capital Bhopal reported 33 cases, followed by Dhar with 13 cases, 12 each in CM’s home district Ujjain and Khandwa district of southwestern MP, 11 in Chhatarpur and 10 in Khargone districts.
The state’s administrative-political capital Bhopal and commercial capital Indore with a total 107 cases, constituted 38% of the 283 total cases registered across the state.
The state government also informed the Vidhan Sabha on Tuesday that a state-level special investigation team (SIT) was constituted in May 2025 to probe all the cases registered under the concerned law so far.
The MP Freedom of Religion Ordinance 2020 and its successor MP Freedom of Religion Act 2021 were promulgated to regulate religious conversions in the state. It aims to prohibit conversion through coercion, force, misrepresentation, undue influence, allurement, fraud, or marriage.
The Act requires individuals seeking conversion, and those performing or organizing the conversion, to declare the proposed conversion to the District Magistrate 60 days in advance. Violations can result in imprisonment and fines.