Jealousy has prompted attacks: Christian priest
Sandeep Mishra,TNN
PHULBANI: Seventy-year-old Sankirtan Digal of Gadragaon in Kandhmal's Chakapada block got drawn towards Christianity when he was young. However, communal tensions in 1970 made him "reconvert" to Hinduism. But he did not stop visiting the church. His children, too, prayed to Christ, leaving Sankirtan and his family at odds with the Hindus of the village.
Today, his family lives in a relief camp in Bhubaneswar in the aftermath of the anti-Christian violence that engulfed Kandhmal in August. Sankirtan is now contemplating revisiting temples. Like him, Gadadhar Digal, 75, too is going back to being a Hindu. "We can no longer live in Gadragaon without accepting Hinduism," said Gadadhar, fear writ on his face. "We want to save our lives. What difference does temple or church make?" asked Sankirtan.
But why did they leave Hinduism for Christianity in the first place? "Christian missionaries invited us to the church and we felt nice. So we changed our religion," both maintained. But Kartik Behera of the same village has a different take: "Churches give people money and free health care and education. Therefore, many like Sankirtan and Gadadhar converted to Christianity."
If Behera is to be believed, Christian missionaries, churches and Christian-funded NGOs encourage villagers to join their ranks by offering "service" and "reward". "Those who become Christians wear better clothes. They tend to adopt officer-like lifestyle," said Nanda Gonda, a Hindu of Gadragaon, whose children turned Christians.
But an agitated RSS worker of the area says, "Hundreds of crores of rupees from foreign Christian organisations are being pumped into Kandhmal every year. After all, how else would they be able to build big buildings for churches and other institutions?"
The "socio-economic gains" in the form of access to missionary-run educational institutions in Kandhmal and elsewhere, better health care, jobs in churches and other institutions for the converts is a major cause for heartburn among local Hindus. And while most church-goers don't admit they have benefited financially from converting to Christianity, they accept their economic status has improved over the past few years.
"We've worked hard to improve our economic condition. This has made others jealous," says Ranjit Naik, a pastor of Barakhama village in Baliguda area. Naik, originally a Dalit, belonged to the Pana community, a sub-caste of Hinduism, but like thousands of other Panas of Kandhmal, he practices Christianity. "Treated as untouchables, we weren't allowed to enter temples. Christianity gave us a new identity," said Kamal Digal of Barakhama.
"Why should we be part of a religion that doesn't recognize us as human beings? We will die but not become Hindus again," he said. Apart from inviting the wrath of Hindu fundamentalists, what has landed the Panas in trouble is their decades-old ethnic strife with the tribal Kandhs, the dominant group in the district.
While Panas have largely sided with Christians, the Kandhs are more Hinduised. Consequently, the ethnic discord is now tinged with a communal hue. "The Panas have cheated Kandhs for decades and stolen our lands, jobs and even tribal status," said Lambodar Kanhar, the most prominent Kandh leader of the region. "We have demanded verification of forged caste certificates submitted by Panas for reservation benefits. Pana-Christians are faking as SCs and benefiting. They have cornered jobs meant for tribals," Kanhar alleged.
While Christian organizations have been working in backward districts like Kandhmal for nearly a century, providing schools and hospitals, saffron outfits like VHP and Bajrang Dal have, over the past four decades, entered the region. Though conversion is an issue in other tribal areas of Orissa as well, religious friction has turned violent in Kandhmal largely because the VHP and Bajrang Dal have succeeded in exploiting the tribal angst against Dalits.
"We've been working among tribals to improve their socio-economic condition. We are strongly opposed to illegal proselytisation. Those who realize that they had been misled and made Christians prefer to return to the Hindu fold," said Uma Shankar Acharya, state coordinator, Bajrang Dal.
Sociologist Prof Anup Das said: "The poor have no religion; their only faith is food. The conversion-reconversion farce is linked to the endemic poverty in Kandhmal. Hence, we often see the poor getting duped into joining one religious group or the other, while the economically better off and informed people refrain from doing so."
Source: The Times of India
Date: September 30, 2008 |
