Why India is witnessing an attack on Christians, churches | Religious Affairs

New Delhi / Roorkee, India – Late October, Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi met and summoned Pope Francis to India, a country with a large Christian population in Asia.

However, speaking about two weeks earlier, Mohan Bhagwat, chief of the right-wing Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), Modi Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) religious adviser warns Hindus about religious conversion and “demographic change” in the northeastern parts of India, where the majority of Christians live.

In his annual speech on October 14 celebrating the Hindu festival in Dussehra (also known as Durga Puja), Bhagwat stated: And this policy should be applicable to all regardless of race or belief. Unauthorized migration in border states and conversion to [the] in the northeast it has dramatically changed the population. “

RSS wants to create a Hindu country from India. As the head of Sangh Parivar, an umbrella group of Hindu organizations including the BJP, the Bhagwat term of Dussehra is considered to be the founder of the year.

Christian uprising throughout India

As events unfolded, Bhagwat’s rhetoric intensified with the violence of Christians and congregations in various parts of India, with violent mobs openly “cutting off their heads” and abandoning them. pronounced conversion of Hindus.

Three days later, Rameshwar Sharma, a BJP representative in Madhya Pradesh, summoned “Chadar Mukt, Mr. Mukt Bharat” (an Indian non-Muslim veil with Christian priests) to address the crowd.

On Sunday, south of Karnataka in the town of Belur, members of the Bajrang Dal, a right-wing Hindu group that harassed minorities, disrupted a Christian prayer rally, accusing the community of converting.

On the same day in New Delhi, a warehouse that had been converted into a church was demolished and Sunday mass was disrupted by the same group, whose members were seen shouting “terrorist attacks” in a video found by Al Jazeera.

The church that was destroyed in Dwarka in Delhi is said to be Bajrang Dal by RSS. The congregation held their first Sunday prayer. One person was injured. pic.twitter.com/f0X9Xm5vf7

– Nikita Jain (@ nikita_jain15) November 28, 2021

On October 3, a group of about 250 Hindu people with iron rods took over a church in Roorkee north of Uttarakhand, which is run by the BJP. Witnesses told Al Jazeera that only about 12 people were in the church when the attack took place.

Pearl Lance, the daughter of a church pastor, is said to have been raped, abused, and beaten by women, and had her cell phone confiscated. Rajat Kumar, a church worker, was hit several times with metal rods on his head, seriously injuring him.

“He dragged me down my throat and made me fall on my face and back. I fainted when I was hit on the head with a stick, ”Kumar told Al Jazeera, with his right eye badly injured and swollen.

Eva Lance, the pastor’s eldest daughter, said that the couple reported that the police had done at least four suspicious acts before. “We received the threat of Christianity and the unknown men who pursued us before the conspiracy. He accused us of proselytizing and threatened with violence. I sent an email, went to the police and filed a complaint on October 2, “he told Al Jazeera.

He also said police responded late when the attack took place. “The police assured us of security but no one came to our aid. Even on the day of the attack, we continued to call the police but they only came an hour later and the group was destroyed, ”he added.

Police have even issued a report against the pastor’s family, forcing him to convert, for promoting religious dissent, for conspiracy, and for theft.

Musical instruments were destroyed after a Hindu group demolished a church in Roorkee [Alishan Jafri/Al Jazeera]

Chhattisgarh is a ‘new anti-Christian laboratory’

According to a report by human rights groups in October, more than 300 attacks on Christians took place in nine months this year, including at least 32 in Karnataka.

The report found that of all the 305 cases of anti-Christian violence, four countries in northern India registered about 169 of them: 66 in BJP-controlled Uttar Pradesh, 47 in Congress-controlled Chhattisgarh, 30 in Jharkhand-controlled state. 30 in Madhya Pradesh controlled by BJP.

Nearly nine Indian states have enacted anti-conversion laws, including Chhattisgarh, which, according to activists, has emerged as the “new laboratory” of anti-Christian extremism in India.

On October 1, more than 1,000 people gathered in the state of Surguja in Chhattisgarh for the “Band Karo Dharmantran” (Stop the Conversion of Religion) rally – one of the events organized in anti-proselytism attire in central India.

Speaking at the conference, Parmatmanand Maharaj, a right-wing Hindu leader, urged people to “make an ax to educate converted Christians”.

“Why do you keep an ax in your hand? Cut off the heads, ”he said, urging the crowd to follow the words“ Roko, koko, thoko ”(Stop, warn and kill) against Christians.

Among his listeners were BJP MP Ramvichar Netam, former BJP MP Nand Kumar Sai and Chhattisgarh state BJP Nand Anurag Singh Deo.

Sushil Shukla, head of Congress’s co-ordinating department, which oversees the government, criticized the BJP for “ending” and “promoting religious hatred”. He said the government would take action against those planning the Surguja summit after the investigation.

TR Koshima, a police superintendent in Surguja, told Al Jazeera that he was investigating the case but no initial report (FIR) – a document prepared by the police upon receipt of information about the offense – had not been released.

“Even as the investigation continues, the amount of talk that could be seen as the cause because no violence that took place later in the state should be seen,” he said.

However, it was not uncommon in Chhattisgarh in recent months.

The video is from Raipur, Chhattisgarh.

Bajrang Dal militants stormed a local police station and brutally beat a Christian relative, who had been arrested on suspicion of proselytizing. pic.twitter.com/8j5K1WXfJ4

– HindutvaWatch (@HindutvaWatchIn) September 5, 2021

On September 5, a Christian pastor was summoned by police for questioning after he complained about the wearing of clothing at the Raipur government headquarters. When he arrived at the police station, he was allegedly beaten by the same gang.

In the same month, a video of a woman – wearing a Hindu sleeveless dress – beating a pastor in front of police in Bhilai state spread.

Jyoti Sharma, a woman accused of sedition, told Al Jazeera that he had done nothing wrong. Although he acknowledged that the FIRE had been set against him, he called it a “threat” and said it would not prevent him from “doing ‘kutai’ and ‘thukai'” (attack and beating).

In July this year, Sunil Sharma, the chief of police in Sukma district in Chhattisgarh, issued a petition asking his subordinates to monitor the “activities” of Christian missionaries.

Hall destroyed inside church in Roorkee, Uttarakhand BJP government [Alishan Jafri/Al Jazeera]

Mu Karnataka also, with the BJP-led government, the Christian uprising has increased dramatically in recent years, according to William Michaels, president of the United Christian Front.

The government recently ordered the “investigation” of churches in the state to determine if they had “forced conversion” and sent police to find out more about them.

In October, a group of right-wing activists stormed a church in Hubballi and chanted “bhajans” (Hindu hymns) in what they called dissent.

A number of pastors and Christians in Belagavi say they have been given “loving warnings” by the police not to go to church to pray until the district convention begins in mid-December. In this section, the anti-conversion bill should be provided by the BJP.

Workers at Bajrang Dal entered a Christian prayer hall in Hassan State, Karnataka to disrupt prayers and talk about conversion.@TheQuint pic.twitter.com/cljKvnueZ7

– Nikhila Henry (@NikhilaHenry) November 29, 2021

‘Christians after Muslims’

Dharamlal Kaushik, a BJP MP and opposition leader at the Chhattisgarh rally, told Al Jazeera that his party “does not oppose the general public but Congress should abandon the politics of voting banks” – referring to the few potential voters in India.

Asked about the escalation of violence and anti-Christian rhetoric, Kaushik questioned Congress on “silence on the issue of conversion” and criticized the opposition party for the growing “Hindu conversion to Christianity”.

“Recently, a Hindu right-wing militant group is attacking Christians,” a Christian activist who writes anti-tribal lawsuits told Al Jazeera, refusing to be named.

“We can not see the massive gathering in Chhattisgarh, the uprising of the church in Roorkee, the police crackdown in Sukma, the ‘search’ of churches in Karnataka, and Mohan Bhagwat’s case of conversion as a special event. In short, it is Christians after the Muslims. is new but wants to make it public. ”

Apoorvanand, who teaches Hindi literature at the University of Delhi and writes frequently against religious violence in India, said “incidents of anti-Christian violence are extremely traumatic”.

“This is not being said as much as it should be,” he said.

“By choosing another target (excluding Muslims) in so-called separate cases, the Hindutva project in India adds diversity to the ideology of its anti-minority hatred. and nature. ”