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Trafficking-conversion case: Chhattisgarh court grants bail to Kerala nuns

Trafficking-conversion case: Chhattisgarh court grants bail to Kerala nuns

Catholic nuns Preethi Merry and Vandana Francis, with Sukaman Mandavi, were held at Durg station on July 25 over alleged forced conversion and trafficking of three girls from Narayanpur
A special court in Chhattisgarh's Bilaspur district on Saturday granted bail to three persons, including two nuns from Kerala, arrested on charges of human trafficking and forced religious conversion, lawyers said.
Principal District and Sessions Judge (NIA court) Sirajuddin Qureshi had reserved the order on their bail pleas after a hearing on Friday.
The court has granted conditional bail to the trio, defence lawyer Amrito Das said.
Catholic nuns Preethi Merry and Vandana Francis, both from Kerala, along with Sukaman Mandavi, were arrested at the Durg railway station on July 25, following a complaint from a local Bajrang Dal functionary, who accused them of forcibly converting three girls from Narayanpur and trafficking them, a railway police official had said.
Following the bail hearing on Friday, Das had said that the prosecution had not asked for the trio's custody for interrogation, and the alleged victims had been sent back to their homes.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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