A Catholic crisis in India

To name the Catholic Herald's correspondent in India would endanger his life. He speaks out against growing persecution of Catholics in the Indian subcontinent constitution was the Indian
constitution was drawn up one of the advisers of Pandit Nehru was a Jesuit, Fr Jerome D'Souza.
It was agreed that the Christians would not have a separate allocation of seats in Parliament, but Article 25 of the constitution guarantees anyone, of any religion, freedom to preach, practise and propagate his or her religion provided this does not conflict with law and order.
The vast majority of people in India and senior government officials are tolerant and fair. But, as in so many other cases, there are fanatical fundamentalists.
The whole world knows about the destruction of the mosque at Ahyodya which generated enormous riots all over the country and elsewhere.What is less well known is that, more recently, Christians and especially Christian missionaries have been at the receiving end of the unkind attentions of certain people.
These have come in the shape of numerous cases of robbery, often with violence, mostly against nuns.
Very recently Sr Rani Maria, a good nun who had been doing much social work to uplift the poor near Indore, was brutally stabbed in the bus in which she was travelling, dragged out of the bus and then stabbed again, 40 times in all.
Hindu fundamentalists, who were responsible for the murder, protested at the funeral procession and the 30-day commemorative function. Speeches were given during which fanatic Hindus threatened to eliminate Christian institutions.
And there are numerous other incidents: three years ago two sisters of the Order of St Mary of the Angels, who were running a home for poor boys in Bombay,
were raped and murdered. Instead of defending them and trying to apprehend their murderers, the police and press put out a report that the sisters had been engaged in sexual misdemeanours.
In another case in Northern India, six nuns were raped and more than one priest has been kidnapped. On Sunday April 2, 1995, five nuns of the Order of St Mary of the Angels working in Shramik Vidyapeeth in Delhi were brutally assaulted by armed intruders in the early hours of Sunday.
There are many other cases that have been reported or gone unnoticed. Some are simple cases of robbery, in others priests have received death threats. The writer of the present piece has already received three.
Another practice, which in a sense is even more disturbing, is that of finding or claiming that a Moslem or Christian religious structure was built on a previously destroyed Hindu temple.
In those cases where there is no historical evidence, someone would hide a statue of a deity in or near the relevant church or mosque and a procession would be formed to offer puja (worship). This often led to a riot.
This almost happened in Pondichery near Madras, where fundamentalists claimed that the Cathedral had been built on a Hindu temple. Fortunately, the
authorities took action in time and the editor of the Statesman a leading paper in India wrote an article on the front page of his paper showing that the temple in question had been built about 500 yards away from the Cathedral and the remains of the temple were still there to prove this.
JR Victor Karunan, a wellknown journalist, writes in a Herald of March 1995 "The fear that minorities as a whole Muslims and Christians are under threat from groups of Hindu zealots in the country has been confirmed by a fresh wave let loose recently to free ancient caves of non-Hindu structures.
"It is now the turn of the seventh century Mandapeshwar cave in Borivli, a suburb of Bombay, to become the focus of attention of the saffron movement (Hindu Fundamentalist).
"These caves, the centre of a prolonged legal battle over ownership rights between the Union Government and the Catholic parish of Mount Poinsur, are now being eyed by the Sangh Parivar (Hindu fundamentalist) to further its ends."
THE leader of a Hindu group has said publicly that his organisation is training an army of of 8,000 to get rid of the Christians in India. A document has been circulated that purports to give instructions from an extreme fundamentalist group (Rashtrya Sevak Sangh) entitled "How to Torment the Scheduled Castes and Tribes: Muslims, Christians etc." Among these are explicit instructions for placing idols near non-Hindu religious structures.
An apparently less offensive but really more sinister attack is through the media especially in Indian films.
Christian girls are depicted as of loose morals, wearing suggestive dresses, and Christian men are friends of the chief crook and bootlegger. To make matters worse, bitterly critical and sometimes vindictive writings like those of the brilliant journalist Arun Soutie (Minionaries in India...) have fermented anti-Christian feelings among an otherwise sympathetic public.
Though we Christians of India are not perfect, the vast majority of us are devoted and devout citizens, eager to help and serve our fellow countrymen.
Our schools and hospitals serve vast numbers of nonChristians. More and more we try to serve the poor in the villages rather than the rich in the titles. In his village the present writer has a Hindu secondary school with 700 poor children. There is not a single Catholic among them. The little hospital in the mission serves mostly delivery cases.
There are now Christian primary schools, Secondary and higher secondary schools and hospitals of different kinds, and St John's Medical College in Bangalore has an international reputation.
The services rendered by Christian organisations attract the admiration of everyone. What is more remarkable is that Christians go and serve in places where no one else will go.
Many of us have distinguished ourselves in the Sports field, armed services and even in the Government of the country.
Some Christians have also given their lives for the sake of their country.
It is sad that because of the fanaticism of the few the good name of this great country should be spoiled and so many people, including Hindus themselves, should be harmed.