ICC Note: Christians leaders in India’s Jharkhand State have stood with indigenous people to assert their religious freedom rights. Often, India’s government categorizes traditional religions practiced by indigenous peoples as Hindu. This is an outright denial of the religious freedom rights of indigenous peoples across India and serves the Hindu nationalists’ ideology of One Nation, One Culture.

04/27/2018 India (UCAN) – Thousands of indigenous people marched through the streets of Gumla town in India’s Jharkhand state demanding recognition of their traditional religions.

The rally of about 10,000 people on April 24 aimed to put pressure on the eastern state’s government run by the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which considers indigenous people as Hindus and refuses to give official status to the animist Sarna religions.

Church leaders and activists working for indigenous people said the rally succeeded in bringing together indigenous people of diverse groups and religions.

The government is counting Sarna followers as Hindus as part of a political game, said Father Cyprian Kullu, vicar general of Gumla Diocese, which supported the rally.

“It is certainly a positive move because this was the first time in the region that indigenous people of all religions have come on a single platform and demanded their rights,” Father Kullu told ucanews.com.

He said the ruling government and Hindu groups worked to keep the state’s indigenous people divided for political purposes and to weaken their efforts to assert their rights.

“The success of the mega rally proved that people have understood the agenda behind the politics of the divide-and-rule policy,” Father Kullu said.

…

For interviews with William Stark, ICC’s Regional Manager, please contact Olivia Miller, Communications Coordinator: [email protected]