Panaji: Goa police have arrested a 21-year-old Muslim man for allegedly stalking and raping a 16-year-old Hindu girl from Mormugao taluka. The man is also accused of trying to convert the minor after she became pregnant, claiming that his family would accept her once she is converted.The minor told police in a statement that he kidnapped her after threatening to circulate her compromising photos on social media and took her to Solapur. After a few days, they moved to Hospet in Karnataka from where she was rescued.Police had initially filed an FIR for kidnapping. Following her statement and medical examination, rape charges and Pocso sections were added to the FIR, said Verna PI Anand Shirodkar.“He (accused) continued to threaten me and forcefully have sex with me. I have been pregnant four times. Then, he started forcing me to convert to Islam,” the survivor said in her statement to police.She said he forced her to stop practising Hinduism and asked her to stop wearing bindi and ‘kumkum’. “He started making me wear a black dupatta and cover my face to look like a Muslim,” she said.The survivor said he told her not to visit any temple or do any Hindu rituals and if she wanted to pray, she could go to a mosque. “One day I brought small pictures of goddess Laxmi and Ma Kaali to the room, due to which the accused started fighting with me. The accused burnt goddess Laxmi’s picture,” she said in the statement.The minor also said the accused and his friend made a fake Aadhaar card by changing her name.She also said the accused’s mother and sister told him to wait and hide for two years, and after she turned 18, they would get them married. “Whenever he would go to work, he would lock me in the room and leave. One day he took me to a dargah where we stayed for two days. He made me wear a tabeez,” she said.Police were able to trace the minor after she contacted them through her brother’s friend when she was able to get hold of a phone.
