Indian Bible Students Attacked, Evangelist Killed as Hindu Violence Spreads

Rajasthan state detained "hundreds of Bible students" over the weekend amid spreading Hindu violence across India, which killed at least one evangelist since last week, church officials said Tuesday, February 22. 

The students, who arrived by train in the state’s eastern Kota district to attend a graduation ceremony on Saturday, February 19, were taken into custody by local police after a violent "Hindu mob" accused them of "preaching Christianity," claimed Bishop M.A. Thomas of Emmanuel Mission,  which supports the Bible school.

All have since been released and sent back to Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh where they came from,  according to church officials. The incident in Kota comes just days after the body of 25-year-old Christian evangelist Pastor Narayan was found in the small town of Channapatana in India’s Karnataka state.

Doctors who performed an autopsy said Narayan had been "brutally murdered". as the corpse had broken ribs and teeth as well as injuries to the abdomen. But, "the official report of the autopsy suggested it was a case of suicide," argued Sajan K. George of the Global Council of Indian Christians, who demands an official inquiry.

"COVER UP"

George accused Hindu militants of being responsible for Narayan’s death. He said their sympathizers are engaged "in a cover-up", a pattern allegedly seen in other Indian states such as Rajastan, the scene of this weekend’s attacks against Bible students. 

Bishop Thomas suggested to BosNewsLife that Saturday’s troubles began "as soon as the train [carrying the students} halted at the station. [Hindu] activists…got into the train and attacked the participants with knives, bicycle chains, and sticks," he said.

"They did not even spare ladies and children. All were crying and screaming for help.  They also beat up the lady principal of a local Catholic school, Sophia School, who was traveling in the same train," the bishop added.

HINDU TEMPLE

Thomas said 20 staff members, who were at the railway station to welcome the graduation participants, were "forcibly taken to a Hindu temple" nearby "and beaten up brutally" with some receiving "deep cuts on their foreheads."

The Hindu activists allegedly also snatched their belongings, including cell phones. Thomas said "biased" railway police refused to intervene and instead detained the students, some of whom were injured.

"Instead of protecting them, [they] treated them like criminals," before releasing them  the next day, he added. "They were taken for first aid hours later. They wanted to go to a hospital, but they were not allowed to move out of the premises of the police station," Thomas claimed.

ORGANIZERS CONCERNED

Police officials were not immediately available for comment. Organizers of the upcoming
31st annual convention and graduation ceremony from February 23 to 27 expressed concern about the alleged lack of police security and the apparent refusal of local authorities to intervene.

The State Social Welfare Minister, Madan Dilwar, has ordered an inquiry into allegations that Emmanuel Mission is "indulging in conversion activities and sent four senior officials of his department to Kota for holding a detailed probe," reported a national daily, The Hindu, on Tuesday February 22.

Hindu attacks apparently continued Monday, February 20, when "a mob of about 60 people gathered in front of my house and shouted anti-Christian slogans asking us to stop preaching Christianity and go away," said Thomas.

FEW CHRISTIANS

Rajasthan shares a border with Pakistan and Christians are merely 0.1 percent of the over 56 million population of the state, according to estimates.

The government of Rajasthan, is ruled by the pro-Hindu Bhartiya Janata Party, which church officials say is known for giving "a free-hand to Hindu fundamentalists" since it came to power on December 8, 2003.

There have been other attacks in India against Bible students recently, while Christian tribal Christians in some areas of the country face death unless they leave their villages, BosNewsLife learned. Others, including India’s most impoverished ‘Dalit’ Christians, have been forced to "reconvert" to Hinduism, although some attempts failed,  church leaders say.

Evangelical analysts link the reported attacks to concern among Hindu extremists about an apparent spectacular church growth in India,  a country of over 1 billion people. (Based in New Delhi,  Journalist Vishal Arora, 32, has covered persecution and other hard hitting news stories for a variety of international and national publications. He has traveled around the country on invitation by NGOs for seminars and talks on human rights, communalism, and religious persecution. Vishal Arora can be contacted at e-mail address vishalarora_in@hotmail.com or visit his website http://www40.brinkster.com/vishalarora/ )