Rajasthan youth goes missing for 2nd time, 23-year-old girl from city grilled

The youth identified as Jithender Tejaram, a B. Com graduate, whose roots are in Rajasthan, had been helping his father in cloth business in Padappai near Chennai.

“Jithender went missing earlier in January 2017. Kancheepuram police managed to trace him in March this year by checking his girlfriend’s mobile phone contacts. We came to know that her friends had taken him to Mumbai where Jithender got converted to Islam and was being trained by a suspected radical group. 

He was traced to Mumbai and handed over to his father, who took him to his native Bilara in Jodhpur district in Rajasthan on April 11, this year. But again he went missing on May 2. We don’t know if he was a victim of so called love jihad,” police sources said here.

Tejaram, father of the missing youth, claimed that his son was forcibly converted to Islam and radicalised. “I don’t know if he is alive or dead. He never disclosed the reason for his conversion,” he told DT Next on Monday.

The Rajasthan police grilled the girl, an engineering graduate residing in Kotturpuram, with whom Jithender was believed to be in a relationship on Saturday, for over five hours in an effort to know the whereabouts of the youth.

The case of the Rajasthani youth missing from the temple town had first reached the local police more than a year ago when his father lodged a missing complaint with the Manimangalam police in Kancheepuram district.

Though his father raised suspicion of religious conversion, officers probing the case said that it could be confirmed only after the youth was traced.

The complaint filed by Tejaram on January 1, 2017, stated that his son Jithender Tejaram, a B. Com graduate, had gone missing.

After finding out that he was in touch with the 23-year-old girl at that time, officers from Manimangalam station had questioned her.

But she maintained she did not know anything about him.

However, police sources said they found evidences that the girl was a crucial link to his conversion, as Jithender had converted to a Muslim at Ahamed Nagar in Mumbai through her friends.

Following this, he had changed his name to Mohamed Islam, sources added.

The youth was traced and handed over to his father on March 15 and he was taken to his native place Bilara in Jodhpur, where he was converted back to Hinduism.

However, he went missing from there on May 2. 

Investigation revealed that Jithendar had come to Chennai and thus a team of Bilara police, consisting of SI and head constable, reached Chennai and questioned the woman with the help of the local police. Though Tejaram alleged that his son was forcefully converted as a Muslim, the police noted that the background of his decision would be known only after he was located.