Scores of prestigious educational institutions run by Christian missionaries in northwest India went on a one day strike on Feb.3 to protest against concerted efforts by certain forces (Hindu fundamentalists) to drive them out of India. The strike was unprecedented and it affected lakhs of students mostly belonging to elite families. Spokesmen of the community in their statements left no one in doubt about the fact that Hindu fundamentalists had made Christians and their institutions the target of attacks of late. The provocation for the strike: was provided by a series of violent attacks on the hapless nuns in Punjab by “biri smoking” gangs who could be cither Indian armed security men or members of Hindu fundamentalist organizations. The dividing line between members of the security forces and Hindu organizations is blurred in India’s context; overwhelming majority of the Indian security forces is drawn from the upper caste Hindu community.
There is a calculated plan to keep Muslims and other minorities out of India’s security setup. If recruitment of a minority community’s members becomes unavoidable, special efforts are made to train him politically so that he is even more nuthless in suppressing minorities than members of the majority community. That explains the ruthlessness of men like KP.S, Gill, Robeiro and Mohammed Mustaffa. Complaints of police partisanship in handling riots involving Hindu attacks on Muslims have been too frequent to be ignored. Thus it is difficult to dismiss the recent attacks on Christians nuns and their institutions as the handiwork of antisocial elements. The police in each of the three recent cases was informed by the representatives of the managements of the institutions of the need to provide them with security but to no avail. If spokesman of the community now sees a concerted attempt to drive out the missionaries from Punjab and other states in the northwestern states, he cannot be accused of exaggeration.
The grievance of the missionaries is understandable. The literature produced On Hindu organizations and allowed to be circulated by the Indian govt. is full of venom against Christian missionaries, and Muslims in particular and Sikhs in general. All the troubled states in India Punjab, Kashmir, Nagaland, Assam etc. are inhabited by minorities such as Sikhs, Muslims and Christians. The current phase of the rise of Hindu fundamentalism could be traced to the Operation Blue Star in 1984. Later Kashmiris were targeted, the demolition of the Babri masjid is fresh to bear reminder. There have been sporadic attacks on Christian missionaries in Madhya Pradesh, U.P., Orissa and other states. But it is for the first time that the states like Punjab and Haryana have claimed the ‘violent attention of the Hindu fundamentalists. The public opinion in the west has to see the massive Christian protest strike in north India on Feb.3 as a part of a wider political phenomenon in that country, The incidents in Punjab are by no means isolated in nature. They are the inevitable result of the rising Hindu fundamentalism, militarism and communal intolerance. The western tendency to dismiss Sikh reactions against the Indian State’s violence as terrorism betrays lack of Indian reality. The only difference between the Sikh psyche and the Christian reaction is that Sikhs have been taught not to take things lying down. It will be known before long that Punjabi Christians, too, will not take things lying down should the Hindu fundamentalists persist in their campaign of intolerance.
Article extracted from this publication >> February 5, 1993
