Reported on 18th Sept,2008
1000s of terrified Indian Christians are hiding in the forests of Orissa while the religious fundamentalists are burning their homes and killing them without any reason.
What actually is happening in India is that mobs are targeting churches, orphanages and homes of Christians, Twenty people have now been reported dead and two of them were deliberately burnt to death and this is in the aftermath of the murder of Hindu leader Lakshmananada Saraswati. The Christians in India are terrified they left their homes and are taking shelter in forests.
A Christian religious leader said that even in the forests they are not safe. This is not the first time that we are seeing religious hatred in India, in the past we can see examples of Muslims being targeted and the violence cannot be explained in words. Very little or no media coverage and we are generous enough to give them a name of religious fundamentalism not terrorism.
A person spoke to the media that a group of 1000 people fired guns in the air and told them to leave their homes if they wanted to live and they were chanting anti Christian slogans. The condition over there is worse those who have taken shelter in forests are with no food and any facilities and those who have been hiding in their homes are facing the same problems. The people who have taken shelter in the forests are terrified to go back to their homes. They said that the group targeted every single Christian in the community and they have the names of all the Christian houses, churches and institutes. The Church also said that 3,000 houses have been destroyed, more than 60 churches have been burned down and at least half a dozen convents.
It is believed that 150,000 Christians have taken shelter in Hindu neighbour whereas 5000 are believed to be in the forests and 10,000 in government camps. A shoot on sight order has been passed by the government to end this violence.
I will like to highlight one thing, it is that for a couple of hundred of crack heads why are we blaming the religion for it. Even I am against the idea of categorizing the religion into fundamentalist, modernist and rationalists. By categorizing the religion we are actually hijacking the original meaning of religion these people who are involved in the religious hatred should be given a name of terrorists like we gave it to Taliban’s in Afghanistan.
Indian Prime Minister described it as a “National Shame”. Again no matter how much we condemn this it will still be going on in India where it is a common practice. I think they should take lesson from the neighbour country Pakistan where Christians are in minority and they have been seats in National Assembly and in 60 years they haven’t seen any kind of incidents. Despite of the fact Indian Government always blame Pakistan of the rising Taliban’s in tribal areas of Pakistan. Again the question arises why the religious hatred incidents only occur in India.
I think the people who are behind this organized target killings should be arrested and they must face the law. The government of India should prevent such incidents from occurring in future.
India Exposed 