NEW DELHI – Nearly a year of attacks on Christians have put India’s leaders on edge, and the latest flare-up in violence drew an angry denunciation from the country’s Sikh prime minister as “acts of national shame.”
“We are a secular state. We are a multireligious, multicultural nation,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told reporters during a stopover in France.
Hours later, Hindu mobs rampaged through villages in eastern India on Tuesday, attacking a Christian minister, damaging two churches and setting off Hindu-Christian clashes that killed at least one person.
It was just the latest in a string of attacks by Hindu hard-liners since December that have left dozens of people dead, dozens of churches destroyed and thousands of people homeless, many forced to live for days in thick forests until they could make their way to safety.
In a country where Christians are a tiny minority, the attacks reflect how large swaths of India – despite a highly educated urban elite and its increasing role as a global economic power – are riven by religious and cultural animosities and how those divides are woven into political power struggles.
“We are very much under threat,” said New Delhi Archbishop Vincent M. Concessao, the president of India’s National United Christian Forum.
Just over 80 percent of India’s 1.1 billion people are Hindu, but the nation is officially secular, a fact often played up by government leaders.
They note that religious minorities, such as Christians, who account for 2.5 percent of the people, and Muslims, who make up 14 percent, often coexist peacefully with Hindus. Some have risen to the highest levels of business, government, military and entertainment.
But throughout India’s history, religious clashes have erupted regularly. And while Hindu-Muslim violence is often the bloodiest, Christians have also faced the wrath of Hindu militants.
Much of the recent violence has been in the eastern coastal state of Orissa, which has long been a battleground over Christian conversions of low-caste Hindus and missionary work among the indigenous people known in India as “tribals.”
Orissa state law forbids conversion without police approval, and Hindu hard-liners allege that Christian missionaries coerce or bribe people to convert.
The missionaries deny forcing anyone to convert. Conversion to Christianity offers a partial escape from the stigmas of the Hindu caste system, and some missionaries run medical clinics and schools that can be far better than state-run institutions.
When violence boils up in Orissa, it can be horrific. In 1999, an Australian missionary who ran a medical clinic was burned alive – along with his two children – by a Hindu mob.
The latest troubles began after the Aug. 24 slaying of a hard-line Hindu leader, Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati, who had become known for advocating the reconversion of Hindu villagers who convert to Christianity.
Police blamed atheistic Maoist extremists for the killing, but right-wing Hindu groups blamed Christians and set fire to a Christian orphanage. That has been followed by mob attacks on churches as well as shops and homes owned by Christian. At least 28 people have been killed.
Militants Hindus argue their country’s true religion is being undermined by Christian missionaries they accuse of using bribery, pressure and even murder to gather more followers.
“Hindu culture is under attack,” said Gauri Shankar Rath, a top official in the VHP, the umbrella organization of Hindu nationalist groups.
The local government’s response to the violence after the Hindu priest’s slaying was halfhearted, and weeks later attacks are still flaring up.
And the trouble has spread. Hindu mobs attacked more than 20 churches and prayer halls in the southern state of Karnataka on Sept. 14, injuring at least 34 people. There have also been attacks on Christians in the states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Madhya Pradesh.
Ramachandra Guha, a historian, sees the trouble – particularly in Karnataka – as a display of political strength by right-wing Hindus.
The violence there, he noted, began just months after the BJP, the Hindu nationalist party that is now India’s main opposition group, rose to power in the state government.
“It’s a flexing of muscles by the Hindu right-wing,” Guha said. The BJP is in the mainstream, he said, but when it won power in Karnataka its followers “at the extreme end of the spectrum felt they could do what they want.”
Associated Press – October 1, 2008
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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posted October 1, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Oh yeah that’s a good response “set fire to an orphanage. I’ve always look at the Hindu Cast system for exactly what it is, shameful. Of course some so-called Christians did participate in slavery here in America but that day is gone and the poor wrestle with a more subtle slavery.
India has it’s hand full there is so much hatred in the cast system they will find it hard to come to love each other so how will they find a way to love others?
posted October 1, 2008 at 7:51 pm
These Hindu’s who came into government and used their position to push their extremism of the Hindu’s religion should be kicked out of the government. You notice extremism doesn’t work in anyones religion…don’t you? Extremism doesn’t work in anyones government, either.
posted October 1, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Unfortunately the extremists in all religions give the good followers a “bad” name. It is truely unfortunate,IMO, that some folks are so convinced that they have the only true religion that they have to kill to prove it! All religions are equal, but some folks can’t tolerate the idea the some folks change their minds and decide to leave one set of beliefs for another. The Hindu’s certainly seem to have a problem with the Christians and the Christians seem to have a problem with Hindu’s. However I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the Christian missionaries used unorthodox methods to “convert” the Hindus.
posted October 1, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Actually not all religions are equal; there are many religions that are certainly unique in their practices. Some are altruistic and some are self oriented, some worship a god of some sort and some worship plants and trees and some planets, some animals. Some religions are based on the discipline of enduring self inflected pain or denying self of basic needs for punishing unreasonable periods of time. Some religions involve human sacrifice some involve wild animal hunts or some other accomplishments as a rite of passage. Some religions involve taking drugs and natural mind altering substances and some involve sex. I’d be willing to bet that there are some religions in the world today in remote regions that we have no knowledge about, that would make no sense to us and would be hard to even imagine the reasoning behind it. So not all religions are equal at all.
posted October 2, 2008 at 9:42 am
Hinduism as a whole is known for being a very tolerant religion. I don’t think you will find much in Hindu doctrine that preaches violence. This is an example of plain human viciousness.
posted October 2, 2008 at 10:34 am
The violent response of the Hindus cannot be excused. However it does seem that the evangelical zeal of the Christian missionaries may have provoked the attacks. Again, there is no excuse for the Hindu extremeist’s response. However if the missionaries were a bit more sensitive about their presence in a community much of this could be avoided. The point of conversion is not to make political statements. The caste system simply complicates an already tense situation.
We have the same xenophobic issues here. Minority religious cgroups are targeted by extremists and little attention is paid by the media or the public. Violent outbursts by any and all religious groups simply highlight the severe limitations of that religion. It becomes much harder to make the case for peace and justice when it seems to take very little to instigate acts of stupidity, fear, and hate.
posted October 2, 2008 at 11:26 am
jest Actually the attacks were made on their own people not missionaries. Many people from India are of Christian faith some families become Christians because other family member’s faith convinced them.
I think most missionaries I have met are very sensitive to cultures of the countries they serve in they are deeply sensitive people, so it’s not fair to place the blame for murder upon them it’s the murderers fault not the non-violent care giving missinaries.
I know some people from India that have been Christian all of their lives and they travel home to visit relatives and are in danger from these Hindu sects.
Despite one’s dislike for Christianity, you simply cannot blame the missionaries for the murders committed.
These Hindu sects will take and destroy even if missionaries weren’t there.
posted October 2, 2008 at 11:46 am
ck,
I have no dislike for Christianity. If I did, I woud surely be in the wrong profession. What gripes me is the self-righteousness of some missionaries. I will grant gladly and whole heartedly, that most missionaries are not forceful or rude. But it takes only a few of any fanatics – Christian, Hindu, Moslem, Jewish, or anything else – to make the wider populous forget the benefits people of fatih bring and focus solely on the problems. As I said, there is no excuse for the Hindu violence – against their own people or others – in the name of religion.
posted October 2, 2008 at 12:22 pm
cknuck, IMO just because there are certainly differences in beliefs, and those in one religion don’t happen to understand or agree with another’s beliefs, doesn’t mean they aren’t equal. I disagree with many other beliefs, however I don’t think my beliefs are better than others. Mine work for me, as they should, as those of other faiths find that theirs work for them. Religion/beliefs are personal. Yes, there are extremes…drugs, sex, communion, self inflicted pain, some worship gods/goddesses, and maybe still human sacrifice (but not many if any,IMO), some worship animals, some have complicated rites to enter as adults into the beliefs etc., but again beliefs are the choise of the participant. No ones beliefs are better or superior to anothers.
However I don’t condone violence of one religious group on another religious group, or even the pushing of ideas on another group. Extremes of any kind, not good.