Violence against Christians in India is religiously motivated violence against Christians in India. Human Rights Watch has classified violence against Christians in India as a tactic used by the right-wing Sangh Parivar organizations to encourage and exploit communal violence in furtherance of their political ends. The acts of violence include arson of churches, conversion of Christians by force, physical violence, sexual assaults, murders, rapes, and the destruction of Christian schools, colleges, and cemeteries.
Anti-Christian violence increased dramatically since the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) started its rule at the centre, first in March 1998 and more recently in 2014 (incumbent). The Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), Bajrang Dal, and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) are the organizations which have been most frequently accused of inciting the violence.
Hundreds of incidents of violence against Christians are reported by various organizations every year. India's ministry of internal security and its National Commission for Minorities officially list more than a hundred religiously motivated attacks against Christians each year.
As of 2020, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom placed India as Tier-1 in minority persecution along with countries like China, North Korea, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
Context of violence Indian Christians were relatively unaffected by communal violence until the end of the 1990s and enjoyed social harmony with the majority Hindu community. However, the late 1990s saw a significant increase in acts of anti-Christian violence, and the year 1998 was the turning point. In the ensuing years, they were denounced in anti-Christian propaganda and they were targeted for violence by Hindu nationalist groups which wanted to prevent tribal voters and lower-caste voters from converting to Christianity. In March 1998, after the BJP came to power, anti-Christian violence dramatically increased.
Historically, the BJP and the Hindu nationalistic Sangh Parivar organizations were more likely to accept violence against minorities than their rival Congress Party. In most reported cases the named perpetrators are members of the Sangh Parivar organisations. The Sangh Parivar are small subgroups that formed under the umbrella of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), an umbrella organisation whose roots date back to 1925. The RSS, who promote a form of nationalism, oppose the spread of "foreign religions" like Islam and Christianity. The Human Rights Watch report stated that Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), Bajrang Dal, and RSS (the sister organisations of the BJP) are the most accused organizations for violence against Christians in India. Although these organizations differ significantly in many ways, have all argued that since Hindus make up the bulk of Indians, India should be a Hindu state. RSS volunteers are taught to believe that India is a nation solely for the Hindus and that Hindus have suffered at the hands of invaders, notably Muslim rulers and Christian British. The Human Rights Watch reported that the attacks against Christians are part of the right-wing Sangh Parivar organizations' orchestrated effort to encourage and exploit sectarian violence to raise their political power base.
A 1999 Human Rights Watch report stated that in many instances, Christian institutions and individuals were singled out for violence in response to their efforts to promote education, good health and financial independence among the members of the tribal and Dalit communities. The Human rights Watch report also noted that a significant reason for the publication and circulation of anti-Christian propaganda and the acts of violence which it contributes to is a vested interest in keeping these communities in a state of economic dependence.
In 2008, the National Commission for Minorities reported that the State governments which were controlled by the BJP and its allies supported the perpetrators of violence against Christians. Anti Christian violence also intensified after the BJP came to power in 2014. Manifestation Each year, India's internal security and its National Minority Commission officially list more than a hundred religiously motivated acts of violence which are committed against Christians, but the actual number of such attacks is probably higher, because Indian journalists estimate that only about 10% of such attacks are ever reported. These attacks include the ransacking of churches, monasteries, and other Christian institutions, the burning of copies of the Bible, the desecration of cemeteries, the murder of priests and missionaries, and the sexual assault of nuns.
From 1964 to 1996, at least 38 incidents of violence against Christians were reported. In 1997, 24 such incidents were reported. Since 1998, Christians in India have faced a wave of violence. In 1998 alone, 90 incidents were reported. According to the Indian Parliament, between January 1998 and February 1999, a total of 116 attacks on Christians occurred around the country. Many of the attacks occurred in the north and west, where the Christian community is smaller and has strong Hindu nationalistic sentiments. A November 2001 survey by the National Commission for Minorities reported 27 attacks on Christian institutions and Christians in 1997, 86 instances in 1998, 120 instances in 1999 and 216 attacks in 2000. According to the commission, the persecution of Christians had increased since the Bharatiya Janata Party came to power in 1998. In 2001, the All India Christian Council reported that Indian Christians are attacked every 36 hours.
Multiple news organizations reported an increase in the number of incidents of violence against Christians after the new BJP government under Narendra Modi came to power after the general election in April–May 2014. In 2014, the Ministry of Home Affairs reported a "steep 30 per cent rise in the number of communal violence incidents in 2013 as compared to 2012, with the maximum number of cases being reported from Uttar Pradesh.” Reported incidents of abuse carried out against Christians in India went up to 177 in 2015, and escalated to 300 in 2016, according to the Evangelical Fellowship of India (EFI). In 2017, EFI reported an increase in attacks by right-wing activists on churches on Sundays and other significant days of worship, such as Good Friday, Palm Sunday, Christmas and Easter. The police are being used to disrupt and prevent worship in churches and homes, particularly Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Christian children traveling to Bible camps were put into detention and held for days on suspicions of conversion.
The persecution of Christians in India sharply increased in the year 2016, according to a report which was published by Open Doors. India was ranked 15th in the world in terms of danger to Christians, up from 31st four years earlier. According to the report, it is estimated that a church was burnt down or a cleric beaten on average 10 times a week in India in the year to 31 October 2016, a threefold increase on the previous year. According to the All India Christian Council, there was an attack on Christians recorded every 40 hours in India in 2016. In a report by the Indian organization, Persecution Relief, the crimes against Christians increased by 60% from 2016 to 2019. There were 330 incidents in 2016, 440 incidents in 2017, 477 in 2018 and 527 incidents of hate crimes in 2019. The organization reported there has been a direct link between BJP gaining power in a state and increase in the attacks against Christians in the state. In the first seven months of 2022, over 300 attacks against Christians were reported across the country.
Mainstream Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christians are targeted far less frequently than Evangelical and Pentecostal Christians.
Causes and effects Political factors Hindu nationalists fear that as a result of the arrival of non-Hindus, higher fertility rates among minority groups and conversions to Christianity, the Hindu majority might become a minority. Hindu nationalists feel that if the Christian population increases, it will affect the dynamics of electoral politics and India's status as a Hindu nation. Basing their fear on their assumption that Christians have opposing allegiances, Hindu Nationalists portray conversions to Christianity as a national threat, because they reduce the number of people who have a shared national identity, a national identity which is vaguely claimed to be Hindu. The percentage of Christians, however, has dropped from 2.53% in 1971, 2.43% in 1991 to 2.3% in 2011. However, the VHP, which has a declared agenda of converting Christians and Muslims to Hinduism, opposes the constitutional right of a person to follow any religion. Despite the small number of Christians, as per the BJP's declared agenda of establishing a Hindu Rashtra, the other faiths are seen as enemies and must be ousted.
In the 2007 Khandamal violence, a pro-Kandha tribal group, the Kui Samaj, resisted the request of Pana Christians to modify the official recognition of Panas from Scheduled Caste to Scheduled Tribe that could have enabled Pana Christians to benefit from the reservation system even after conversion. The Kui Samaj planned a general strike to express their case. The members of the local Sangh Parivar who joined the strike caused the violence to rapidly spread by bringing the issue to the locals and they also prevented the police from adequately responding to it.
American political scientist Paul Brass argued that the generally insignificant, local communal conflicts in India are turned into larger instances of communal violence by groups which he calls 'conversion specialists'. Chad M. Bauman argued that the Sangh Parivar leaders followed the same technique in the 2008 Kandhamal riots by linking their local politics and clashes with broader national fears like extinction of Hinduism, a Christian demographic increase and even a 'Christian military coup'. Thereby providing justification for the anti-Christian violence and thus issuing a 'national call to arms' for the defense of the Khandamal Hindus.
Cultural factors The Hindu nationalist version of Hinduism and its Sanskrit overtones generally do not fascinate the adivasi people and the Dalits. From the late nineties, affiliates of the Sangh Parivar such as the Vanavasi Kalyan Ashram began to set up schools for adivasi people and Dalits where simple skills were taught along with Religious teachings which were aimed at bringing the more Sanskrit and all-India upper-caste Hinduism into sync with the Dalit and Adivasi faith and ritualistic practices. The presence of Christian educational institutions in these regions has become a competitive challenge and an obstacle to this Hindu nationalist project.
Even though the participation of the non-Christian tribals than the nationalists not from the Dangs district in the 1998 attacks on Christians in Dangs district is very marginal, which may stem from them benefiting from Christian aided development projects. Even before the violence, there were tensions between both the Adivasis and the Christian Adivasis primarily because Christianity was seen as a cultural disruption. Christians have often rejected alcohol, which is a significant part of the regional festivity. Christians often did not take part in village rituals, often performed for the wellbeing and security of the entire village, which were viewed un-neighborly. The very willingness of Christians to break the traditions of the village is seen as a cultural threat. Thus, many members of the lower caste and tribes claim of Christian conversion as something of a deculturation just in the same way as the Hindu nationalists of the upper-castes do.
Economic factors