India’s Anti-Religious Freedom Laws

Commentary Three state governments in India have recently passed new “freedom of religion” laws, also known as anti-conversion laws. The new laws are an attempt to suppress the alleged “love jihad”—an attempt by Muslim men to marry Hindu women with the intention of converting their wives to Islam. Historically, India’s anti-conversion laws differ slightly by state, but as the U.S. Library of Congress noted, “All of the laws seek to prevent any person from converting or attempting to convert, either directly or otherwise, another person through ‘forcible’ or ‘fraudulent’ means, or by ‘allurement’ or ‘inducement.’” For example, Madhya Pradesh enacted its first anti-conversion law in 1968. Recently, Madhya Pradesh instituted the Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act 2021, which penalizes religious conversion by marriage or through fraudulent means. Under the new law, “no person shall convert or attempt to convert, either directly or otherwise, any other person by use of misrepresentation, allurement, use of threat …