Horrifying footage captures the moment a labourer in India was hacked to death and set alight in an apparent anti-Muslim attack.

The axeman, understood to be a Hindu targeting Muslims guilty of so called 'love jihad', recorded himself stalking the man before brutally cutting him down with a machete and then setting him alight.

'Love jihad' is a term used by religious radicals in India to accuse Muslims of marrying Hindu women in order to convert them.

Lasting more than four minutes, the appalling attack involved the man hacking at labourer Afrazul Khan with a machete and pickaxe before speaking to the camera.

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Horrifying footage captures the moment a labourer in India was hacked to death and set alight in an apparent anti-Muslim attack. Shambhu Lal Regar (left) of Rajisthan, hacked labourer Afrazul Khan with a machete and pickaxe before setting him alight (right)

The man attacking him, identified as Shambhu Lal Regar, was seen beating the victim, repeatedly hitting him with the axe before reaching for a billhook machete and delivering a potentially fatal blow. He then doused his victim in kerosene and set him alight.

During the attack Regar said to the camera that Muslims 'face the same fate' if they carry out love Jihad.

The killing occurred in western Rajasthan state, which has seen a spate of vigilante attacks on Muslims in recent months.

Most of the attacks have been related to the transporting of cows, which Hindus consider sacred, by so-called 'cow protection' groups who roam highways inspecting livestock trucks.

The state's police chief O. P. Galhotra told reporters the suspect had been charged with murder, calling it a 'brutal crime'.

Police have also detained the suspect's 14-year-old nephew, who they say recorded the killing.

Religious conversion has become a worrying issue for Hindu nationalists in recent years.

Last month, thousands of copies of a controversial booklet were distributed to students at an event in Rajasthan warning Hindu girls of 'love jihad'.

In April a 20-year-old Muslim man was lynched in eastern Jharkhand state for dating a Hindu woman.

Critics say vigilantes have been emboldened since the election of the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014.