Catholic bishops from Orissa warned this week that Hindu extremists have a “master plan” to wipe out Christianity in the remote eastern Indian state.
In a letter to the state’s chief minister, Naveen Patnaik, the Indian bishops conveyed their concerns about the mass “exodus of Christians” from Kandhamal District and addressed the “considerable reduction” of refugees in relief camps, according to Catholic News Agency.
The bishops said the Christian refugees were not leaving the camps to return to their homes. Most, they reported, were moving to relief camps in other areas such as in Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Jhanla, Berhampur, or have moved into rented houses, homes of relatives, friends or acquaintances.
“It is estimated that 10,000 to 15,000 Christians of Kandhamal district are living outside the district,” the bishops wrote in the letter to the minister.
And while displaced Indian Christians want to return to their villages, they still fear being attacked on their way back or in the village themselves, the bishops added.
Another factor hindering the people’s return are reports of forced conversions. The bishops said that in some incidents, Christians were being pressured to choose to “accept Hindu Samskaras under oath and under pain of divine punishment”.
They are also forced to convert to Hinduism or forfeit the harvesting of their field. One man was even denied burial in his village because he was not a Hindu, the letter highlighted.
The bishops are concerned that most of those who brutally attacked the Christians in the latest outbreak of violence have not been brought to justice.
The state government has not arrested or brought the criminals to court, the bishops complained, nor has it fulfilled its promises to allot land and money to the now homeless Christians.
Some 50,000 Christians have been displaced during the more than two months of anti-Christian violence in Orissa. About 30,000 of the people are said to be living in refugee camps where the living conditions are poor.
