Some Hindus joined a Christian rally rally to protest a recent attack on five Catholics, including a priest, while other Hindus organized a rally to justify the attack.

Both rallies were held on July 2 but at different places in Karnataka state. The Christian rally was held in Mangalore, a port town 2,290 kilometers south of New Delhi. The Hindu rally was at Kundapura, some 80 kilometers north of Mangalore, where Carmelite Father Sylvester Pereira and the four others were attacked on June 25.

Condemning the attack, Yogesh Bhat, a leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, Indian people's party), told the Mangalore rally he would "ensure justice for Christians."

The Hindu leader blamed criminals for the attack and said his party, widely seen as the political organ of Hindu nationalists, was not involved. He said he has visited Kundapura's Infant Jesus Shrine, which Father Pereira manages. "I know the noble services rendered by the Christians," he asserted.

The protesters accused the police of negligence and bias in handling the case.

Suspected Bajrang Dal (party of the strong and stout) activists attacked Father Pereira, 36, two seminarians, their cook and a neighbor inside a hospital in Kundapura.

The attackers forcibly took the Catholics to the local police station and filed a case against them for "forcible conversion." The police then detained the Christians in the station for three hours.

M.G. Hegde, a Hindu social worker who attended the Mangalore rally, said nobody has "a right to attack Christians and call it an act of protecting Hinduism." According to him, "99 percent of people" of all religions "do not propagate violence and they condemn the attack on the priest." He urged the administration to view the attackers as mere criminals and punish them.

Hegde regretted the country now lacks leaders who can speak on national integrity. What it has instead are party leaders who propagate violence, hatred and issues for their survival, he said.

The Hindu rally in Kundapura reportedly justified the attack on Catholics, with speakers describing such actions as necessary to protect Hinduism from conversion-minded Christians. Some urged Hindus to follow Dara Singh as a role model in punishing missioners.

Dara Singh was convicted in 2003 and sentenced to death as the leader of a mob that burned to death Australian missioner Graham Stuart Staines and his two minor sons in Orissa, eastern India, in 1999. In 2005 the Orissa High Court commuted his death sentence to life in prison.

Krishnaprasad Adyantaya, one of the speakers, reportedly said Kundapura has several Dara Singhs ready to foil all attempts to convert Hindus. Adyantaya is a managing trustee of a local temple. He alleged that Christian social services and institutions are means of mass conversion. He commended Ramanna Shetty, a Bajrang Dal activist identified as one of Father Pereira's attackers.

The Hindu groups' call for a strike in Kundapura town reportedly produced a poor response.

The Christian rally made no anti-Hindu remarks but stressed communal harmony and national integration. "It was more an interreligious celebration rather than a protest rally," remarked Neri Wilfred Pinto, a Catholic layman at the Mangalore program.

Roshan Castelino, president of Konkani Yuva Awaz (voice of the Konkani youth), a Catholic youth movement that organized the Mangalore program, said leaders they invited from the BJP and other Hindu groups responded "positively."

The rally also prepared a memorandum to present to the state chief minister demanding a separate law to deal with atrocities against religious minorities. The memorandum also complained that the police resorted to "delay tactics" in handling the Kundapura case and showed a "soft" spot for the attackers.

Source: UCA News
Click here to return to homepage