Allahabad HC Flags Mass Illegal Arya Samaj Marriages, Dismisses Plea In Minor’s Rape Case

Last Updated:July 28, 2025, 16:52 IST

Court dismissed a petition filed by a man accused of kidnapping and raping a minor, rejecting his claim that the two were married.

Court directed the Uttar Pradesh Home Secretary to investigate how such Arya Samaj organisations were able to operate freely despite allegedly flouting legal norms. (Shutterstock)

The Allahabad High Court has raised alarm over the growing number of allegedly illegal interfaith marriages being conducted by Arya Samaj temples in Uttar Pradesh, many involving minor girls and lacking proper legal formalities. Court also dismissed a petition filed by a man accused of kidnapping and raping a minor, rejecting his claim that the two were married.

Justice Prashant Kumar, while hearing a plea filed by one Sonu alias Shahnur, declined to quash the criminal proceedings against him. The applicant had challenged the 2024 summoning order and sought to halt trial proceedings in a POCSO case registered against him.

As per the FIR filed in 2020, the girl’s father alleged that his minor daughter was abducted by the applicant. Sonu claimed the two had married in an Arya Samaj Mandir in Prayagraj a day before the complaint was filed and that the girl later chose to live with him after becoming an adult.

The court, however, found that the girl was a minor at the time of the alleged marriage, and that no valid religious conversion had taken place between the interfaith couple as required under the UP Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021. Court also noted the marriage certificate issued by Arya Samaj was unregistered and possibly fabricated.

Further, court added that the marriage had not been registered under the U.P. Marriage Registration Rules, 2017.

Referring to a previous case (Shanidev v. State of UP), the bench pointed to an “astonishing" number of marriages being conducted by Arya Samaj institutions in the state, often without due diligence.

Therefore, court directed the Uttar Pradesh Home Secretary to investigate how such Arya Samaj organisations were able to operate freely despite allegedly flouting legal norms.

The probe is to be led by an officer not below the rank of Deputy Commissioner of Police, and a compliance report is to be filed by August 29, 2025.

Salil Tiwari

Salil Tiwari, Senior Special Correspondent at Lawbeat, reports on the Allahabad High Court and courts in Uttar Pradesh, however, she also writes on important cases of national importance and public interests fr...Read More

Salil Tiwari, Senior Special Correspondent at Lawbeat, reports on the Allahabad High Court and courts in Uttar Pradesh, however, she also writes on important cases of national importance and public interests fr...

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