Christians are ‘target practice’ for communal groups, say community leaders

According to the 2011 Census, Uttar Pradesh has the second-lowest population of Christians among all the states in India. Yet according to the data collected by the Evangelical Fellowship of India, which is a national alliance of over 65,000 churches, UP recorded the highest number of cases of violence against Christians in 2018 and 2019.

Human rights organisation United Christian Forum, which also collects data on violence against Christians, recorded more than 500 cases across India in 2021. Of these, 102 were from UP.

“UP has recorded the maximum number of incidents in 2021,” said Reverend Vijayesh Lal of EFI. He pointed out that usually, the total number of cases of violence against Christians in India hovers between 100 and 200. In 2021, the figure was more than double. Lal fears this year will be worse because of the upcoming Assembly elections in UP, Uttarakhand and Punjab.

“Muslim bashing is always there but we, Christians, are target practice. We are not collateral damage, we are target practice,” Lal said.

The rising graph

Founded in 1951, EFI has maintained a record of cases of violence against Christians since 1998, which was the year of the deadly attack against Christians in Dangs, Gujarat. In January 1999, Christian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons were burnt to death by members of the Bajrang Dal in Odisha.

Lal said EFI’s data shows a steady rise in the number of atrocities since 1998.

EFI’s records generally show higher numbers than those of UCF, which has been collecting this data since 2015. Michael said this was because EFI was able to verify more cases of violence since it’s a larger organisation.

Both UCF and EFI’s records show that while the graph has been rising steadily, the total number of cases of violence exceeds 200 only occasionally, like in 2008 when more than 1,000 incidents were registered because violence erupted against Christians in Kandhamal, Odisha, and in Karnataka.

According to UCF’s founder A C Michael, most recorded incidents take place in rural areas and usually occur during prayer gatherings. In 2021, of the 505 confirmed cases of violence, 420 were recorded in rural areas.

“The most attacks were recorded in four states, which are Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh,” said Michael.

The cases that UCF includes in its records are those that have been verified after being reported either in the media or to UCF’s helpline. The incidents range from physical assault, intimidation, restrictions on religious assembly, damage to property and cases filed under any anti-conversion law.

EFI’s data shows UP has seen a sharp spike in the number of cases of violence against Christians since 2018. It is yet to release its numbers for 2020 and 2021.

Creating a record

According to Lal, less than 10 percent of the cases recorded by EFI include a first information report filed at a police station.

“The most common reason is fear of the consequences of registering an FIR because they have to continue living in the area. The second is non-cooperation of the police. Too often, we find the police are eager to sweep it all under the carpet and push for the victims to compromise. But the compromise usually happens after slapping charges against the Christians who have been victimised in the first place,” said Lal.

Michael said UCF’s records show the violence against Christians varies from mob attacks to social boycott and denial of permission for assembly. The justification proffered by perpetrators is invariably the same – the Christians are accused of attempting to forcibly convert non-Christians.

However, Michael pointed out that there is no data from either the Indian government or any other reliable civil society group to substantiate the allegations of forced conversions.

“I am ready to have a dialogue with anyone who claims that there are indeed forced conversions being done. All I ask is that they give me specific instances of who those people are who have been forcefully converted. Then I will sit and talk. But till today, there has been nothing,” said Michael.

Even as the number of incidents of violence against Christians steadily rise and unfounded paranoia surrounding forced conversions gather momentum, the lack of interest shown by the Indian government is frustrating and of concern to people like Michael and Lal.

Each year, UCF sends its report on cases of violence against Christians to the central government, but there has been no official response from any government agency so far.

Similarly, EFI also sends a copy of its report to the government. “All the incidents in EFI records are verified incidents and we always send a copy to the government,” said Lal. “While we may get a response from the NHRC [National Human Rights Commission] once in a while, all they do is open up a case file after which we stop hearing from them altogether.”

The National Commission for Minorities

While NHRC sometimes opens up a case file after receiving reports from EFI – EFI has been notified when this has happened – the matter has never progressed beyond EFI getting a case number. “After that, there is no communication. That becomes the end of the matter,” said Lal.

There is another agency that should be able to come to the Christian community’s aid – the National Commission for Minorities. The agency comes under the Union ministry of Minority Affairs and was set up in 1992. Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis were initially notified as minority communities and in 2014, Jains were added to the list. The NCM and state government-constituted State Minorities Commissions are “to safeguard and protect the interests of minorities as provided in the Constitution of India”.

On NCM’s website, there is a member missing in the present commission.

According to the joint secretary’s office at the NCM, the position of one member has been vacant for a year. None of the existing members are Christian.

Former private secretary with the NCM, Balakrishnan Bhaskaran told Newslaundry, “In the NCM, you have a chairman, a vice chairperson and members for every minority community. After the Jain community was notified as a minority community, I do not think the size of the commission was increased, so I am not sure if all the communities have a corresponding member.”

Bhaskaran said NCM operates as a watchdog body and accepts complaints that come to it. Once a complaint is received, it is entered into NCM’s system and forwarded to the concerned authority which sometimes seeks a report and asks for the status of the case.

“What civil society groups do is that they proactively have a mechanism to track and verify and record what is happening on the ground. However, the question is – who decides what qualifies as an atrocity against a Christian minority?” said Bhaskaran.

“The role of the commission [NCM] is to address the atrocities, but they are denying their very existence,” said Michael, referring to an address made on National Minorities’ Rights Day (December 18) in 2021, when the chairperson of NCM Iqbal Singh Lalpura said there are no religion-based atrocities against minorities in India.

When asked if the NCM can act upon data presented to it by civil society groups like the UCF or EFI, Bhaskaran said, “If a group comes in with let’s say 300 incidents, then the report is sent to the research department or the legal officer who will look at this data. But I don’t think the commission has the capacity or mandate to issue wholesale action against a large number of cases.”

Once a complaint has been logged, NCM seeks a report from the concerned police department of the state. The commission has the power to summon senior police officers like the director general of police, but Bhaskaran said that this authority was rarely exercised.

“After a report is provided, if they are not satisfied then they ask for more information but generally when a senior police officer has looked into it on the ground and sent in their report, that is the end of it. There is not a lot of arm twisting that can be done,” he said.

Lack of empathy?

More than the lack of authority granted to agencies like NCM, it’s the government’s seeming apathy towards the welfare of Christians that is worrying to community leaders.

Father Dominic Emanuel, a former spokesperson of the Delhi Catholic Church who has been in Austria since 2015, told Newslaundry of a meeting he had organised between an ecumenical delegation and prime minister Narendra Modi in 2014.

When the delegation expressed their concerns regarding the rising cases of violence against Christians to Modi, Emanuel said the prime minister completely ignored them. Another member of the delegation, who wished to remain anonymous, said they found Modi’s “lack of empathy shocking”.

“All Modi said in response to our concerns was that he believed in sabka saath sabka vikas [support from everyone, progress for everyone],” recalled Emanuel. Instead of giving any assurance of looking into the issue of increased violence, Emanuel alleged Modi asked the cameras to be switched off before saying, “You all are very good at English and are spreading this kind of news internationally.”

According to the New York Times, when asked about the meeting, a spokesman for the prime minister said these were “unsubstantiated allegations”.

Michael, who was initially supposed to be part of the delegation that met Modi in 2014 but was removed at the last minute, said he decided to set up UCF’s helpline after hearing descriptions of the prime minister’s attitude at the meeting.

The 24-hour helpline, set up in 2015, is the starting point for UCF’s report compiling cases of violence against Christians.

“The helpline is managed by those with a certain degree of legal expertise to assist people who call in with cases. The first step in the verification process is the victim verification. Then people from the UCF get in touch with the accused, and finally the police station is contacted to confirm if an incident of the nature reported has indeed taken place. Only after all three levels of verification are completed that a case is put down as an incident,” said Michael.

Both UCF and EFI’s experience suggests police often put pressure on Christian complainants to not file a report that would culminate in an FIR. Michael said UCF had encountered numerous cases where the attackers were accompanied by the police.

Lal added that between 2012 and 2014, EFI started hearing about new vigilante groups that would target Christians. “Early on, Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad were the main perpetrators,” said Lal. “Now the number of these vigilante groups has also increased. There is the Dara Sena, Dharam Sena, Hindu Jagran Manch, Abhinav Bharat, Amar Sena and a whole lot of other groups that have cropped up.” He said these vigilante groups often “serve a political purpose” and bring local unemployed youth into their fold. “We have noticed this happening throughout the country, especially in the northern and central states,” said Lal.

When asked to comment on the rising number of atrocities, the secretary to the Archbishop of Delhi Father Ajeet Patrick said, “I will say as Jesus said when on the cross. Forgive them Father for they know not what they do. The attacks have caused us pain, but we only pray for them in response. We pray for those who persecute us because they are also our own.”

Lal has a more practical request. “We live in a land which is still a functioning democracy and all that we ask is that the government notice this trend that has been highlighted by the various reports. Our only prayer is that the government looks at these things and investigates and sees to it that the confidence of the Christian minority community is restored,” he said.

Newslaundry sent a questionnaire to the chairperson of NCM regarding the number of cases of violence against Christians that the commission has recorded, the arrests made in the cases and the steps taken by the commission to tackle the rising number of cases.

This report will be updated when we receive a reply.