RSS,VHP VIOLENCE IN ORISSA-RECONVERSION DRAMA WITH PHOTO PROOF

In the name of God

VIJAY SIMHA examines the consequences of lessons taught by men of religion, among the desperately poor in Orissa

WHEN THEY came for Narmada Digal, she wasn’t there. She had fled, five children and mother-inlaw in tow, to the safety of the jungles a kilometre away. So, they set about what she left behind. A framed picture of Jesus, a Bible in Oriya, utensils in the kitchen, some clothes, and linen. By the time Narmada tiptoed back, her home was gone. What was left was still hot from the ashes, and smoking. The neighbours came to commiserate. Narmada took a good look, stood erect, and pulled her sari over her head. She began to pray.

“Lord, forgive us our sins. Jesus, you are the only one. Save us from our misfortune. Free us, Lord.” The words are tumbling out. Narmada’s children have joined her. She is weeping as she pleads for deliverance. So is everybody else. It’s a simple bond that no human wrath can sever, a woman and her God. “I will die. But I won’t stop being a Christian,” Narmada says.

This is in the heart of Kandhamal, a district at the geographical centre of Orissa, ravaged by probably the worst fighting in India between Hindus and Christians. Kandhamal is young, constituted as recently as 1994. It has 2,515 villages spread over 7,649 sq km. The terrain is inaccessible, full of hills and narrow lanes crisscrossing the villages. There isn’t a single industrial unit here. There are no railway lines, and so no trains come here. Buses are rare. It’s so far behind that even the official website of Kandhamal says, “Overall, the district is ranked as a backward district in the state of Orissa .”

In this doleful land live close to eight lakh people. In terms of castes and tribes, the Kandha tribe constitute more than half the population of Kandhmal. The Panos, who are the dalits, form the next big chunk. The Kandha tribe is almost fully under the control of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), an 83-year-old socio-political organisation, which is the fountainhead of many Hindu outfits in India. The Panos are where the Christian community gets its numbers.

In terms of population, nearly a quarter of Kandhamal are Christians, the rest almost wholly Hindus. The percentage of Christians in Kandhamal — 25 percent — is astonishingly high compared to the 2.44 percent for the whole of Orissa. In percentage terms, Orissa has the third-largest concentration of Hindus in India (nearly 95 percent in the 2001 Census). Muslims are barely two percent.

The rise in the number of Christians in Kandhamal is offering radical Hindu outfits like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) the perfect alibi to launch an aggressive anti- Christian movement. The movement has two aims: to reconvert Christians to Hinduism, and to stop the alleged slaughter of cows.

An 81-year-old RSS activist, Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati, was heading the VHP movement in Kandhamal. He operated largely from two ashrams 150 km from each other. He was a member of the VHP’s Kendriya Margadarshak Mandal, a powerful decisionmaking panel. On August 23, Saraswati was gunned down in one of the ashrams at night while celebrating Janmashtami. It was the tenth attempt at killing Saraswati, a figure disliked by the Christians, but revered by a band of fanatic Hindu male followers in his ashram.

Few know who killed Saraswati. But, there are some theories. The Orissa Government says the Maoists (who are trying to build a base in Kandhamal) killed him. The government claim is based on two statements purportedly released by the CPI (Maoist), taking responsibility for the murder. The second statement said: “We have decided to punish anti-people, fanatical leaders like Saraswati because of endless persecution of religious minorities in the country. There will be more such punishments if violence is continued against religious minorities in the country.” It is too pat for the Orissa Government. And, if true, the statements would mean that the Maoists have entered the religious conflicts of India.

A second theory is coming from the VHP. After Saraswati’s murder, VHP International President Ashok Singhal issued a statement saying, “Once again the cruel face of the Christian missionaries has been exposed. Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati was working for 45 years among the tribals by building hospitals, schools and hostels. He was neither a capitalist nor an anti-social. Because of his work, the tribals were awakened to our culture and religion, which was an obstacle only for the Christian missionaries.”

Christian bodies, on the other hand, have a third view. They say they have nothing to do with Saraswati’s murder and have sought an inquiry by the Central Government. The National Secretary of Public Affairs of the All India Christian Council, Dr Sam Paul, said, “The Christian community in India abhors violence, condemns all acts of terrorism, and opposes groups of people taking the law into their own hands. We have had major differences with Mr Saraswati, the deceased VHP leader. It was the hate campaigns of the Sangh Parivar [the RSS is often referred to in this fashion], which led to untold misery for Christians — including the unprecedented violence last Christmas in Orissa. But, we wish peace to everyone and urge everyone to follow the rule of law.”

Whatever the truth, the murder inflamed passions. Even those who do not support the RSS were disturbed by media reports that 30 people in masks and hoods had come to kill Saraswati, and that they hacked at his legs after shooting him. When the Orissa Government allowed Saraswati’s funeral procession to pass across 150km in Kandhamal, reason went out.

By August 25, hordes of Hindu militants were attacking Christian homes and places of worship in Kandhamal. The attacks were mainly at night. On September 1, the Orissa Government told the story in figures: 16 persons killed, 35 injured, 185 arrested; 558 houses and 17 places of worship burnt; 12,539 fed in 10 relief camps; 12 companies of paramilitary forces, 24 platoons of the Orissa State Armed Police, two sections of the Armed Police Reserve Force, and two teams of the Special Operation Group deployed.

The human story is worse. VHP International General Secretary Praveen Togadia, who trained to be an oncologist but who likes nothing better than to drive non-Hindus out of India, reached Kandhamal for Saraswati’s last rites (he was buried in a sitting position — the padmasana — in his Chakapada ashram, where he ran a school and hostel for boys). Togadia said a Christian sect had killed Saraswati. It was enough to trigger murderous assaults on Christians in Kandhamal and elsewhere in Orissa. Hundreds of Christian homes were set ablaze, a few pastors were slain, and warnings were issued asking them to return home as Hindus, or never.

IN SOME cases, the terror works. In the jungles off Sankarakhol village, one of the first targeted by the militant Hindus, a group of RSS whole-timers are reconverting 18 Christians to Hinduism. It’s a daytime ceremony. The RSS Mandal Mukhiya (head of the Mandal unit) Sudhir Pradhan, a slim bearded man, is in charge. There are 30 Hindus to make sure that the 18 Christians don’t change their mind.

Each of the Christians has brought a Bible, in Oriya, along. They have also brought a coconut each, and some incense sticks, red thread to tie around the wrist, and vermillion for their foreheads. The Christians first burn their Bibles in a small bonfire. They sit in a circle. In the middle are the coconuts, each one signifying a Christian, and the other paraphernalia. The God of the Hills is appeased first in a prayer.

Ashes to ashes This woman’s son is still hiding in the jungles

Then, a Christian rises. He has a coconut in his hand. “I swear that I have become a Hindu today. After today, if I ever become a Christian again, may my dynasty perish,” he says. He breaks the coconut on a stone. The other Christians follow, each one making the same promise. Some murmur, some are loud. A Hindu priest begins to apply vermillion on the foreheads of the Christians-turned-Hindus. One of them protests, but it is too late. There’s a red streak on his forehead as well.

Sudhir Pradhan then takes over. Eyes closed, spine firm, and voice ominous. There is a deep and rhythmic chanting of Om followed by the Gayatri Mantra, a sacred chant of the Hindus. The slogans follow: “Bharat mata ki jai.” “Ganga mata ki jai.” “Gau mata ki jai.” “Sri Ramjanambhoomi ki jai.” They pause for a few moments and the Christians-becoming-Hindus kneel, placing their foreheads on the ground. There’s a final “Jai Shri Ram.” The first stage of reconversion from Christianity to Hinduism is over. The motivation for these Christians to reconvert is life. They want to live in Kandhamal, keep their houses and, maybe, get some regular work.

Months afterward, these Christian-turned- Hindus will be asked to attend a yagya — a Hindu ritual of sacrifice that involves the worship of deities, unity and charity. In the yagya, they will wear saffron clothes and a sacred thread, and get their heads shaved. They will offer a few goats and some rice as fee. They will be given Gau Mutra (cow urine) and Tulsi water to drink. They will take Hindu vows. Then, they will share the mutton and rice (cooked from their offerings) in a small feast. This completes their reconversion. From then on, they will have a Tulsi plant in their homes, have pictures of Hindu gods on their walls, and celebrate Hindu festivals. They will pray only to Hindu gods.

Pradhan is happy. He’s done his job for the day. He explains the difference between a Hindu and a Christian. “They (Christians) eat cows. We (Hindus) worship cows.” Therefore, “people who eat cows should be given the same treatment that they give the cows.” Pradhan says Togadia has laid down the policy. “He has already announced that there is no place for Christians. If Christians don’t become Hindus, they have to go. We don’t care where they go. They must leave Orissa,” he says.

BUTWHAT’S the point in killing and driving a people out, merely to nudge the percentage of Hindus from near 95 percent to 100 percent? Dr Krishan Kumar, the young District Magistrate of Kandhamal, thinks it’s actually about jobs, land, and only then religion. Kumar has studied medicine (hence the Dr prefix), and was given overnight charge of Kandhamal when the Hindu militants began attacking the Christians.

Kumar works out of a suite in the Circuit House at Phulbani, the district headquarters of Kandhamal. He has gone two days without sleep during the crisis. After Saraswati’s murder, he was told of the killing of a pastor in Raikia, an area in Kandhamal where the Christians outnumber the Hindus. He drove with a full company of the Rapid Action Force and a contingent of the Orissa State Disaster Management Agency. “It took me 11 hours for a journey that normally takes two hours. There were so many trees cut and laid across the road,” Kumar says.

He explains why he thinks jobs are the first cause of war in Kandhamal. He says his administration has 1,000 cases of fake caste certificates to investigate. Apparently, many non-tribals, which in Kandhamal usually mean the dalits, have submitted fake certificates showing them as members of the Kandha tribe.

The certificates enable government employment in the reserved quota. This is possible because the law enables job reservation for the Scheduled Tribes (ST) even though they have converted to Christianity, while the Scheduled Castes (SC) are deprived of this quota if they convert to Christianity or another religion. This is a principal reason why the Dalit Christians are seeking reservations as well.

Government jobs are precious in Kandhamal, since there are barely any private outlets offering employment. So, the STs seethe with resentment against the SCs over jobs. Often, they fight. Since the STs are Hindus and the SCs form the bulk of the Christians, the battles can easily take a religious turn.

Then, there is land. “The tribals have been around forever. They are the original dwellers here. They never had to prove that they owned the land. I mean, why should they? In the early 1900s, the tribal land opened up. Pattas, a certificate indicating ownership of land, began to be given out. The tribes have a complex social structure. Within themselves, they had given land to neighbours for various reasons. When they had to prove ownership of land, they couldn’t. Others came in and the tribals couldn’t integrate with the market economy,” says Kumar. Loss of land could, therefore, be a cause for the fighting between the STs, who are Hindus, and the SCs, who are Christian.

Reconversion The first act when Christians reconvert to Hinduism is to set fire to the Bibles and put an end to old beliefs. This is the scene in the clearing of a jungle in Kandhamal

Vermillion Red is a favoured colour and the RSS makes a ceremony of applying the tika on a convert’s forehead

The vows A convertee swears that his dynasty will perish if he becomes a Christian again

A new dimension emerged in November 2007 when the Orissa Government said both the dalits and the tribals were part of one family, the Kui Samaj. Kui is the dialect spoken in Kandhamal, and the government intended to bring the dalits and the tribals on a common platform using language as glue. More importantly, it intended to give dalits job reservation and other social advantages that the tribes were given, even if they had converted to Christianity. The tribals objected strongly.

Into this mix enters religion. “Nobody fights over spirituality,” says Kumar. The war is over theology and the power that comes with organised religion. Kandhamal area has a history of 300 years of missionary work. Among the first Christians to work here were Catholics and Lutherans from Madhya Pradesh. These foreign missionaries set up schools and provided medical facilities. In those days, malaria was a major killer. The missionaries would go house to house, and help people recover from malaria and other diseases.

The core appeal of the Christian missionary is this: he helps the locals in distress when the authorities or the RSS are not around. Thus, the motivation for a Hindu to take to Christianity in the past may have been a better life. The Church provided access to better education and improved health. Some of the earliest recoveries from malaria may have helped create the myth of faith healing as well. The concept of miracle cures is a powerful attraction, and many Hindus who convert to Christianity in Kandhamal say they do so because a member of the family was healed when they began to pray to Jesus.

Money and work may be possible motivation as well. Narmada Digal, the woman who stood her ground in her razed home, is convinced. Narmada became a Christian in 1998, when her daughter Subhadra was healed. “She had a peculiar fever, which didn’t go even though I prayed to the Hindu gods. One day my husband told me about a pastor who said we should pray to Jesus. I did, and my daughter was cured. Why should I not be a Christian?” she asks.

Narmada’s husband Goverdhan Digal, who carried the pastor’s message, was employed with the local post office. He often had to take his daughter Subhadra for medical check-ups. One day, Goverdhan’s boss told him he had taken enough days off and had to report for work. Goverdhan had to take his daughter for another check-up. He told his boss that he would be by his daughter’s side. He lost his job. His travails soon reached the pastor’s ears. Damodar, the pastor, talked to Goverdhan about Jesus, the Bible and Christianity.

Goverdhan and his family converted to Christianity. They were given a Bible, and told that Jesus is the only God who gave his life for others. After six months, they were baptised. Narmada says Goverdhan was paid Rs 800 the first month, and Rs 2,000 for six months afterward. Stories like those of Goverdhan and Narmada have helped the Church to spread.

Today, there are around 1,500 churches and congregations in the 2,515 villages of Kandhamal. Between 500 and 750 churches are solid structures, made of marble, wood, cement and even glass. There are close to two lakh Christians in Kandhamal, a quarter of the population. The Catholic Church has a big presence. And among the Protestants, the most active denominations are the Baptists, the Pentecostals, the Church of North India, and the Church of South India.

TO A man like Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati, the rise of the Church would’ve been an insult. To his followers, Saraswati was the incarnation of Parashurama, the first warrior saint in Hindu mythology. Legend has it that Parashurama had killed the Haihaya-Kshatriyas, enemies of the Brahmins, on earth 21 times for their arrogance. Saraswati saw himself as the saint who would vanquish the Christians. Saraswati was a member of what are now called the Most Backward Castes. He was a government employee and quit his job in unpleasant circumstances. Apparently, there were some “irregularities” though the nature of the irregularity is not known precisely. There isn’t much on what he did afterward, except for unconfirmed reports of a police case for murder and criminal conspiracy.

Sometime in the 1960s, the RSS leadership summoned Saraswati. The RSS had begun to implement its plan of working in the most backward areas of India, unlike the Marxists who had begun to work in the industrial townships. The then RSS Orissa head Bhupendra Kumar Basu chose Kandhamal for Saraswati.

From all accounts, Saraswati was a driven man. He pursued his Christian foes with all his energy. By 1969, he had begun his ashram in Chakapada, where he is now buried. The ashram has between 300 and 400 students. All of them are Hindus and trained to be fulltime RSS activists. Saraswati also enlisted volunteers for the renovation of several small and dilapidated temples. And, to thwart the Christians, he worked on the lifestyle of the tribals.

He began to hold satsangs, an assembly of people with the guru who listen to and talk about issues and the truth. Saraswati began to talk of the alcoholic ways of the tribals and started a campaign against beef. His followers say he helped restore healthy lifestyles among the tribals. Coincidentally, the Christians were doing exactly that among their followers.

By 1988, Saraswati opened another ashram, for girls, at Jalesapata (where he would be killed), 150 km from his first ashram. This became controversial and questions were asked of the ethics of a man teaching young women in a residential school. By then, Saraswati had simplified his work into reconverting tribals who became Christians, and protecting cows.

In December 2007, major clashes erupted between Hindus and the Christians when Saraswati ordered his followers to demolish an arch that the Christians had erected on government land in front of a church. The Christians said it was for Christmas and they would take the arch down in a day or two. Saraswati didn’t wait. After his men pulled the arch down, Saraswati drove down to see it. He passed by a village where the Christians outnumbered the Hindus.

Some Christians in the village stopped Saraswati’s car and pulled him out. Stones were also pelted at him. One of Saraswati’s assistants called friends in the VHP and told them “Babaji ko maar diya (they’ve got Babaji)”. Saraswati’s men set upon the Christians on a scale similar to that of the current attacks.

AFTER THE December riots, Saraswati gave an interview, probably his last, to the RSS publication Organiser. He said, “With their numbers increasing, Christians forcefully took away Hindu girls and forced the neo-converts to eat beef.” He said the Christians “threw the mortal remains of cows on temples”. Saraswati said that the Christian missionaries were “serving medicines claiming them to be the prasad of Jesus”. He said the “Church and Christians erect a small prayer house in the middle of a Hindu locality, close to a temple, and after a few years of missionary activity, transform the prayer house into a big church”.

Towards the end of the interview, Saraswati said foreign money was being pumped into churches in India to erect “insolent symbols of the church which offend the eye, the heart and the mind of Hindus”. He spoke of “towering Jesus Christ statues obstructing the skyline, towering steeples with a cross atop, which is visible from a long distance, new and big churches close to old and popular temples”. He called for a constitutional ban on conversion of Hindus to “Abrahamic faiths” and warned that “Christians in India must understand fast that they cannot be protected by the US State Department writing its annual vituperative anti- Hindu reports on religious freedom and human rights”. He added: “Christians can be protected only by the goodwill of the majority Hindus in whose midst they have to live.” These thoughts Saraswati drilled into the Kandha tribals.

The tribals of Orissa are a tough people. They gave Ashoka the Great the fight of his life. Ashoka invaded Kalinga in 261BC. There was no king to oppose him, but the tribals fought against him. Ashoka won the Kalinga War, but 110,000 people died in battle. Ashoka never fought again and took to Buddhism.

It is this lineage that Rupesh Kanhar, 19, comes from. Rupesh and his friends are part of an RSS war council meeting on August 28 in the jungles near Gopingiya village. He passed out of Saraswati’s ashram in Chakapada in 2006. He lives near the jungle and is a fierce member of the Kandha tribe. There are 15 people in the meeting including Rupesh’s friend Bhimraj. They are working out plans to attack Christians. The meeting concludes that they will not kill Christians, but scare them into leaving Kandhamal.

Rupesh recites the RSS prayer fluently. He hasn’t killed a Christian, but he has burned some houses down. In a few hours, Rupesh and his friends will prepare to attack. Some of them would have downed plenty of liquor by then. The group will assemble at 9 pm, about 200 of them. They will have axes, swords and machetes, and torches. They will tie red threads around their wrists, so tight in some cases that they leave red marks on the skin, and they will anoint each other’s foreheads with vermillion. They have colour codes for the headbands. If it’s an ST versus SC battle, the headband will be red. Tonight, it’s a Hindu versus Christian fight, so it will be a saffron headband.

Rupesh and his group will march until past midnight, scaring Christians and sending them rushing into the jungles at night. It’s a daily routine in Kandhamal, the Hindu militants shouting slogans and conducting torchlight marches. A conch is blown. It’s the signal to attack. The slogans come rushing: “Vande Mataram”, “Jai Shri Ram”, “Om, Shanti Om”, “Hindu Rakhiya, Momo Dikhya (Save Hindus, Save our Culture)”. When 200 people say them, even the deaf can hear.

Displaced Christians line up in a relief camp to register themselves

Helping hand Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik consoles a victim

BUT INTROSPECTION respects no ideology. Even the best efforts of the RSS and the VHP can’t stop a change of heart. Vijay Pradhan, 35, is hiding in Raikia. For eight years, Vijay Pradhan says, he was an active RSS worker. He worked with Saraswati and conducted several reconversions. He also trained many RSS workers in the art of reconverting Christians to Hinduism. “I taught people what I was taught. That I must serve the country by fighting the Muslim and Christian religions, which are foreign to us. Our culture had to be saved. Then, one day a young pastor told me about Jesus. I was surprised at his courage in accosting me, but I was curious. This man told me that I could have eternal life with Jesus,” says Pradhan.

The one-time RSS worker says he was confused after this encounter. “I began searching for Jesus because I was intrigued by what I was told about him. On January 26, 1994, I challenged the creator. I asked why there are so many religions if there is one creator. I said whoever you are, I need to know you by name. I threatened that I would turn atheist if the Creator didn’t show himself. I couldn’t sleep at night. At 4.30 am, as I was getting ready for yoga, I saw a human-like figure. There was plenty of light. A voice said, ‘I am the one you are looking for,’” says Pradhan.

He says his thought process changed after this. He began spreading the gospel and going to church. “The RSS workers came to me and asked me why I had converted. They asked me how much money I was given. I used to ask people the same things. But I wasn’t paid. The RSS searched for me. I had to hide in the jungles. As long as there is trouble, I will hide,” he says.

Pradhan says only those who are called by Jesus are the true converts. “Only the attraction of God can make them that. Hindus become Christians, they are never made into Christians. The reconversions by the VHP and the RSS are false. They are conducting a political war in the name of God.”

The state is, of course, missing in all this. The law in Orissa states that religious conversions are allowed. However, people must seek the permission of the District Magistrate. The District Magistrate will enquire into it. If he is convinced that there is no bribe or threat involved, he permits the conversion. Officially, there are only two conversions shown in Kandhamal since 1961.

The retreat of the state is an accepted part of life in Kandhamal. People can tell you who the RSS pramukh is, or who the area pastor is. But they wouldn’t know the names of the Sarpanch, or the police head. Soon, they may not need the state. On the night of September 1, there were two meetings in the Raikia relief camp. The Inspector General of Police chaired a peace meeting with 21 officials and several Christian seniors. Then, a group of young Christian men met separately. They declared pride in two villages of Raikia: Gundhani and Gamandi. Christians mainly populate these villages. Yet, they have been untouched so far. Apparently, because the Christians there have put together a few home-made bombs and repulsed at least one attack by Hindu militants.

The young men said these villages were the pride of Christians and that they had shown the way. They said they needed to arm themselves so that they could fight the Hindu militants. Some pastors objected. They said Christianity doesn’t teach violence. They are not sure if they were heard. •