Recent Incidents of Persecution

Jharkhand – Five extremists attacked Father George Minj and Sister Teresa Kindo from the Gara Lodhma parish near Ranchi, the capital of Jharkhand state, on May 14 as they returned home from a prayer meeting. Sister Kindo said the attackers shouted and ordered them to stop, then began beating them, continuing until they saw a vehicle approaching. The driver of the vehicle took Minj and Kindo to a nearby hospital for treatment. According to Catholic news agency UCAN, the mob beat Minj’s head so severely that his motorbike helmet was damaged, and he suffered blood clots; but he was out of danger at press time. Kindo said their assailants had no interest in their cash and a mobile phone and seemed determined to kill Minj. Police told UCAN the attack was a “serious issue” and that they had registered a case against the unidentified attackers.

Madhya Pradesh – On May 14, police arrested Kunal Pasricha, a Christian worker of the Indian Evangelical Mission, on charges of “forced conversion.” A group of about 70 people from Narayanpur village in Chhatarpur district, Madhya Pradesh, filed the complaint – allegedly at the behest of Hindu extremists – after dragging Pasricha to a police station. Pasricha had been preparing for a screening of a film on the life of Christ. He was arrested under the state anti-conversion law for “forced conversion” and creating enmity between religious communities, according to a statement from the Christian Legal Association of India (CLA). Assistant Sub-Inspector Rajaram Bansal told CLA that the police arrested Pasricha to save him from a possible mob attack. Local Christian Pritam Verma was arrested along with Pasricha. On May 15, a magistrate denied bail to Pasricha, but on May 19 both men were released on bail.

Karnataka – Police accompanied by Hindu extremists interrogated three believers – identified only as Premandam, Antony and Sudhakar – at Bethel Ministries Church, Kushal Nagar, Kodagu district, Karnataka on the afternoon of May 13. “After the police left the church, the extremists thrashed the believers, causing a number of major and minor injuries,” Dr. Sajan K. George, president of the Global Council of Indian Christians, told Compass. “They also threatened to murder Pastor Titus.” The following day, two policemen identified only as Geetha and Sreenivas visited the Christian victims in the hospital and threatened to harm them if they filed a complaint. Geetha and Sreenivas then returned to Bethel Church looking for Titus; failing to find him, they threatened two believers who were praying in the church and asked them to give statements against the pastor. Denying that the officers had made threats, Circle Inspector Vasant Kumar insisted to Compass that Titus was creating a law-and-order problem in Kushal Nagar by “luring” poor people to convert to Christianity. “The local people, including several Bajrang Dal and RSS [Rashtriya Swayamsevek Sangh] cadres, complained to us several times of the conversion activities of Pastor Titus, and our officials only went to warn them to desist from their conversion activities,” Kumar told Compass.