The Hindu
Dec 31, 2007
Editorial
Tackling communal mischief in Orissa
By setting off a spiral of provocation and retaliation, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad is threatening to push Orissa through another spell of communal violence. Over the past week, at least 30 churches, prayer houses, and Christian schools and convents have been attacked or burnt down by VHP activists. Although the State government imposed curfews in the affected Kandhamal district, Hindutva activists put up road blockades in several areas. A police station was attacked when the police tried to prevent an attack on the Christian community in Brahmanigaon. Three persons were killed in the resultant police firing. Evidently the administration did not anticipate that the violence, which began on December 23 after an anti-conversion rally led by the VHP was attacked, allegedly by Christian activists, would escalate so quickly. In some rural areas, the law enforcing authorities failed to act until it was too late. Only when the situation spun out of control did the State requisition the help of Central paramilitary forces. Naturally, questions have been asked about the political will of the coalition government of the Biju Janata Dal and the Bharatiya Janata Party to tackle the recurrent communal mischief.
For the past several years, the VHP and its sister organisations have targeted Orissa’s Christian minority community, which constitutes a mere 2.44 per cent of the State’s population (which is 94.35 per cent Hindu), especially during the Christmas season. As in January 1999, when Bajrang Dal activists burnt to death the Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two pre-teen sons in Manoharpur, the conversion bogey is being raised to target Christians in Orissa. Scheduled Tribes constitute more than one-fifth of the State’s population; 88.2 per cent of the ST population is Hindu and 7.4 per cent Christian, according to the Census of 2001. There is absolutely no evidence to back up the VHP’s claim that missionaries have ‘forcibly’ converted a large number of tribal folk. What the communal outfits are targeting is “the freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practice, and propagate religion” guaranteed as a fundamental right in Article 25 of the Indian Constitution. The administration of Navin Patnaik has been hamstrung by the BJD’s need to protect its political alliance with the BJP. The Chief Minister, who otherwise has a reputation for sober governance, needs to rise above such considerations and uphold the rule of law, especially in Kandhamal district.
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