Hindu Extremists Target Christian Dalits

Attack on hospital in Uttar Pradesh state reflects RSS’s top priority.

8/27/07 India (Compass Direct News) – An attack on a Christian hospital during its program for Dalits in Uttar Pradesh state highlights Hindu extremists’ main objection to Christian work: conversion of people who were once called “untouchables.”

The mob of about 100 people led by Hindu extremists on August 17 barged into the compound of the Kachhwa Christian Hospital (KCH) in the Kachhwa Bazaar area of Mirzapur district and beat and stoned those leading the program for the Dalit students and their parents, according to the Evangelical Fellowship of India.

Dr. Raju Abraham, chief surgeon at KCH, and pastor T.V. Joy were among four Christians injured in the attack. Dr. Abraham, a Christian leader, and Pastor Joy received head injuries as mob leader Anshu Singh allegedly struck them with stones. The mob was said to be led by extremists from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Bajrang Dal, youth wing of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP or World Hindu Council).

There were about 400 Dalits, including women and children, attending the program to celebrate the 60th anniversary of India ’s Independence (on August 15). The attackers also vandalized the hospital and beat Christians and Dalit participants, besides tearing the Indian flag.

On August 16, about 20 extremists had intruded into the hospital compound and warned Dr. Abraham that he would be killed if he continued with the program for Dalits. Dr. Abraham filed a complaint with the Kachhwa Bazaar police station two days later, naming six people who were leading the mob.

Police arrested four of the accused and were investigating the case at press time.

Uttar Pradesh has more than 35 million Dalits out of the total population of 166 million. Christians number only 212,578.

Obstructing Hindu Consolidation

Because conversion of Dalits in most instances happens en masse, Hindu nationalists’ are deeply concerned that Christian work could bring a change in religious demographics.

In 2003, supporters of the RSS promoted a book, Religious Demography of India, warning that more than 50 percent of India would be Muslims and Christians in the following 50 years due to a decline in Hindu population. The book, written by A.P. Joshi, M.D. Srinivas and J.K. Bajaj, was published by Centre for Policy Studies and released by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader L.K. Advani. The BJP is the political wing of the RSS.

According to a 1997 study by the Indian Missions Association, more than 65 percent of Christians in India are from Dalit background. India ’s 2001 Census showed there are about 24 million Christians, or 2.3 percent of the total population.

Dalits make up about 16 percent of the population, or close to 166 million.

With “Hindu consolidation” as one of its top objectives, the RSS has endeavored to halt mass conversions taking place among Dalits.

“RSS is against mass conversions, which are carried on by various churches by means both fair and foul,” the RSS says on its website (http://www.rss.org). “To allow a tolerant person to embrace an exclusionist belief is to turn him into an intolerant person. For this reason RSS is against the proselytizing activities of Christians.” The website includes a special section devoted to “social equality” and “Hindu consolidation.”

While mass conversions to Islam took place decades ago – the latest being in Meenakshipuram, Tirunelveli district, Tamil Nadu state in the 1980s – Dalits continue to convert en masse to Buddhism and Christianity to protest discrimination and atrocities meted out to them by “higher” caste Hindus.

Most recently, hundreds of Dalits converted to Buddhism and Christianity on October 14, 2006 in Nagpur in Maharashtra state as a part of a rally against the caste-system and anti-conversion laws in some states, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported.

As India legally defines a Hindu negatively as someone who is not a Jew, Christian, Muslim or Parsi – as shown in the Hindu Marriage Act – Hindu nationalists oppose conversions to Christianity more than they opposed conversions to Buddhism or other religions unnamed in the act.

The RSS’s objection to conversions is also rooted in Hindutva, a Hindu nationalistic ideology that proposes a nation ruled by those whose ancestors were born in India and who belong to religions that originated here, namely Hinduism and its offshoots. According to Hindutva, the Indian sub-continent is the homeland of Hindus, while Christians and Muslims being “outsiders” are its enemies.

Dalits were formerly called “untouchables” because they were traditionally considered to be outside the confines of caste by so-called high-caste Hindus Brahmins, the priestly class. Their supposed impurity derived from their traditional, humble occupations.

India ’s former national leader, Mahatma Gandhi, applied the term Harijans, meaning “children of God,” to Dalits in the 1930s. In 1949, the Indian government outlawed the term “untouchables,” and reclassified them as the “Scheduled Castes,” granting them special educational and political privileges. But Dalits continue to remain on the margins of society and still face discrimination.