India being secular, democratic and pluralistic (in religious, linguistic, cultural and related terms), another source of violence is the state's failure to uphold its Constitutional obligation of protecting the weaker sections ... and promoting their interests. Related to this are questions about the inadequacies of statutory commissions ... There are three other issues.
One, the nature of the succour provided to the victims of violence. One way of minimising violence and arresting the march of the Hindutva forces is by ensuring that its perpetrators themselves and those who aid and abet them pay adequate compensation, failing which they face imprisonment.
Two, the violence against Christians ... Data available show at least 29 such incidents occurred from 1978 to 1997, and that the state's action in virtually all these cases to bring the culprits to book has been dismally nil.
Gujarat ... in the 36 years up to 1996 witnessed only a single incident, the number rose to nine in 1997 and 38 in 1998. Since the party in power in Gujarat is the BJP, it is only to be inferred that these attacks took place with state connivance ...
If the Christians, more than the Muslims, are feeling threatened under the BJP dispensation, this may be for the reason that tired of the demolition of Masjids, the Hindutva hoodlums are now on the prowl for pulling down churches ... However ... the rapidly unfolding game plan of the Sangh Parivar, (terrorise) not only the Christians ... but also Muslims, and even a majority of the Hindus ...
The selective obsession of the Sangh Parivar with the West is also part of this game plan ... Singhal (wants) ... that India's unwashed millions should continue to remain illiterate so that the upper castes who make up the Hindutva top echelons can continue to oppress and exploit them.
The Sangh Parivar is using the conversion bogey ... to sharpen the communal contradictions between the Hindus and the Christians in a bid to find an emotive platform from which they could launch a full-scale attack on the Congress(I) president, who has of late emerged as the most important political factor in India ... Ever since the demolition of the Babari Masjid, Rama, of the Sangh Parivar's creation, has been either on trial or on the run, and hence no more an issue for political mobilisation.
... While the Hindutva forces do not care for the uplift of the tribals and other Dalits, they do not want other communities to do this either ... Attacking those who are helping the weak, trying to appropriate the whole nation for the Hindutva forces and treating other religious communities as alien are cowardliness at its worst, inhuman and barbaric, which no civilised nation can tolerate ...
Even if conversions are taking place, whether to Christianity or other religions, they are a non-issue for two reasons: (a) conversions are legitimate, well within the Constitutional provisions, and entirely a private and personal affair of every citizen; and (b) though Christianity and Islam have been in India for several centuries and the country was under rulers from these religions for a very long time, the population of Christians and Muslims is less than three and 13 per cent respectively
That apart, since the tribals are animists, one might ask, how the Hindutva forces are concerned about their conversion; and since Hinduism is a non-proselytising religion, is it not deception on their part to "reconvert" tribals to Hinduism ...
The reference to Gandhiji ... is misleading. Gandhiji's references were only to foreign missionaries; but India now does not have any foreign missionaries working anywhere, unless they are mercenaries of the Sangh Parivar. Christian activists ... are mostly from south India, especially Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Gandhiji was also not against conversions per se. He said in "Young India" of April 23, 1931. "I am, then, not against conversion. But I am against the modern methods of it ... (Source: The Hindu, 26 January, 1999)
'Ghar Wapsi' under Pressure
Reconverted tribal Panu (name changed) has lapsed into silence and fear. In words that came to him with difficulty, he told us how he was forced into a jeep by hoodlums who threatened to otherwise burn his hut.
He was driven down to Unai to Swami Aseem Anand's ashram where he was asked to bathe in a hot spring and thereafter handed a photograph of Hanuman and a smaller one of Ram, Lakshman and Shabri, the tribal devout.
A locket of Hanuman and a Hanuman Chalisa booklet were the other hand overs after which he was treated as reconverted.
A praying Christian for 22 years, Panu has since been ridden with immense guilt feelings. Shattered by the experience, he says he was forced into it and himself does not know what to do.
Regardless of what has happened he says he will remain a Christian and continue to pray as he had adopted this faith two decades back after his son was saved with prayers. His elder son had died of the same ailment, he said ... (Source: The Hindustan Times, 19 January, 1999)
