The puzzle of the " Love Jehad"

Over the past few weeks , a new phrase has been making the rounds- the so-called " love Jehad" . My immediate reaction to it when I first heard it was one of complete incomprehension. What could it possibly mean-this " love Jehad" ? Was someone sacrificing themselves for love? Was there a battle on to reclaim a lost love? What was this new obsession? And then the articles went on to explain the " conspiracy" to "convert" girls " unwillingly" to Islam by " Pakistan-backed" Muslim boys in India. At this point, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Just what the hell was going on?So, when these boys were chosen by the "Pakistani agents" , what was the basis for qualification? Were there height-weight requirements? Was there a minimal educational qualification? Where did they find these boys? Did they advertise? On a matrimonial site perhaps? Were they lured into this nefarious plot through some kind of monetary and sexual compensation? I just don't get it. One would assume that if they were being backed by "outside agents" that there was a process of recruitment and adequate compensation promised. Why else would perfectly healthy young men go through all the trouble of seducing these girls ( I mean it is hard work , unless , of course their charms are so great, all they had to do was curl a finger in the direction of the girl. But then not since Don Juan would such prowess be seen and certainly not in college boys.)
The implications of this brand new attempt at humiliation and discrimination of a minority community doesn't show merely the depths to which we humans can sink in alienating those we presume different from us, it also shows how willing we are to poison the minds of our young with our own baseless prejudices. Do none of these parents remember what it was like to be young and in love? Do these people honestly think that when people choose to fall in love , they see the labels of Muslim, Hindu, Christian , whatever, written on their foreheads? What's even more shocking is that a case of this nature would even be heard in a court of law. Do we not have enough injustices to be put right without dragging in such ridiculous cases?
What is this obsession with the " Muslim boys" who seemingly cannot keep their hands and eyes off these girls? Is it really that hard to understand that there is a beating heart in the Muslim?
I read a book by Martha Nussbaum recently where, among other things , she speaks of the stereotype of Muslim men as hyper virile beings who are out to abduct girls etc etc and this was given as one of the explanations for this fear of the " other". Of course colonialism came into the argument. This is also one among many arguments that have been put forth by many , many academics. We can go on justifying all sorts of mad behaviour on the part of those we fear with all manner of psycho-babble and we often do. Intellectuals often theorize everything under the sun. When one model doesn't fit , another is found and made to fit. But in the end , away from the psycho-babble, the theorizing, the utterly tiresome debates of majority, minority , and all the rest, is it so hard to remember that people meet ,fall in love , have disagreements, break up , go their separate ways or live together happily ever after and none of it has anything at all to do with jehad or religion or all the rest of it? This is about people being people. Humans being humans. Let me end with the immortal words of Elizabeth Browning -

" There's nothing low

In love, when love the lowest: meanest creatures

Who love God, God accepts while loving so.

And what I feel, across the inferior features

Of what I am, doth flash itself, and show

How that great work of Love enhances Nature's."