HC relief to cleric named in religious conversion case

Lucknow: The Lucknow bench of Allahabad high court has granted interim relief to cleric Sayyed Zahid Hasan Raana, who has been accused of solemnising nikah of former junior resident of KGMU and a woman last year. The junior doctor is now in jail on charges of forcing a woman colleague to convert. The court has directed that no coercive action be taken against Raana in connection with a religious conversion case registered in Lucknow.The next hearing will be done after four weeks.The order was passed by a bench of Justice Abdul Moin and Justice Babita Rani on a petition challenging an FIR lodged at at Chowk police station under the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021. Chowk police had also got issued an NBW against the cleric on Jan 27.The FIR was lodged against former junior resident of KGMU, Rameezuddin Malik, based on allegations by a woman who accused him of establishing a relationship on the pretext of marriage and later pressuring her to convert her religion. The complaint also referenced another woman who allegedly claimed that her religion had been converted prior to marriage with the accused.The cleric was not named in the FIR and his role was limited to solemnising the nikah at the request of the accused's father nor was he involved in any unlawful conversion, said cleric's counsel Shashank Singh.Singh argued that the nikah was done in the presence of the woman's family members, including her father.