against the Hindu minority in the villages of Noakhali and Tippera in Chittagong district in East Bengal. Rioting in the region began in the Ramganj police station area. The rioting spread to the neighbouring police station areas of Raipur, Lakshmipur, Begumganj and Sandip in Noakhali and Faridganj, Hajiganj, Chandpur, Laksham and Chudagram in Tippera. From 2 October, there were instances of stray killings. Relief operations took place and Gandhiji visited the place on a peace mission even as threats against the Hindus continued. While claims varied, the official Muslim League Bengal Government estimates of those killed were placed at a conservative 200. According to Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, 9,895 people were forcibly converted in Tippera alone. Ghulam Sarwar Hossain, a religious leader who belonged to a local political party dominated by Muslims, was the main organiser of the riot. It was said that the local administration had planned the riot and that the police helped Ghulam Sarwar escape arrest. A large number of victims were Namasudra (a Bengali Hindu lower caste). According to a source quoting from the State Government Archives, in Naokhali 178 Hindus and 42 Muslims were killed while in Tippera 39 Hindus and 26 Muslims were killed. Women were abducted and forced into marriage. In retaliation, Muslims were massacred in Bihar and in Garhmukteshwara in the United Provinces. These attacks began between 25 and 28 October 1946 in the Chhapra and Saran districts of Bihar and then spread to Patna, Munger, Bhagalpur and a large number of scattered villages of Bihar. The official estimates of the dead at that time were 445. Mirpur massacre and Rajouri massacre The 1947 Mirpur massacre and 1947–1948 Rajouri massacre of Hindus and Sikhs in the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, began in November 1947, some months after the partition of India. The Rajouri Massacre ended in early 1948, when Indian troops retook the town of Rajouri. Pakistan The Hindus are one of the persecuted minority religions in Pakistan. Militancy and sectarianism has been rising in Pakistan since the 1990s, and the religious minorities such as Hindus have "borne the brunt of the Islamist's ferocity" suffering "greater persecution than in any earlier decade", states Farahnaz Ispahani – a Public Policy Scholar at the Wilson Center. This has led to attacks and forced conversion of the Hindus. The London-based Minority Rights Group and Islamabad-based International and Sustainable Development Policy Institute state that