Kozhikode: BJP is preparing to come to power in Kerala in 2026 without saying no to the persecution of Christians, orchestrated by its parent organisation, RSS and other Hindutva organisations affiliated to the Sangh Parivar, across the country, the Catholic newspaper in Kerala, Deepika slammed.
A recent editorial of the daily called BJP’s- which rules the centre and most states- double standards extremely shameful. The saffron party, which creates the impression that it is with Christians in states where Christians are a crucial force, including Goa and Kerala, is an accomplice to the persecution of communities taking place in the north Indian states of Odisha and Maharashtra.
The daily wrote that Maharashtra is the latest in a series of new ways that the BJP is finding to exploit communalism and anti-minority sentiments. No one with common sense can understand what the BJP and the Sangh Parivar are hoping to achieve by terrorising the Christians, who are a complete minority in the country, it said.
BJP’s only agenda is to incite the communalism of the majority by portraying social service as a means of conversion. The move to implement the brutal law prohibiting religious conversion, which has been successfully tested in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, has already begun in Maharashtra, the daily noted.
It asserted that the illegal construction of churches is not on the agenda of the Catholic Church. There are already laws in place to prevent and punish anyone, including other Christian groups, from illegally constructing buildings or forcibly converting people. If that is not enough, and if the anti-conversion act, which is widely abused in many states, is being pushed for more stringent implementation, then it cannot be blamed if we suspect that it has some other motive, the newspaper says.
A report by the United Christian Forum says that from 2014 to 2024 when the BJP came to power, there were 4,316 incidents of violence against Christians. In 2024 alone, there were 834 attacks, when it was just 127 in 2014 when Narendra Modi came to power.
According to a report in the Times of India on August 9, in Uttar Pradesh alone, the police registered more than 835 FIRs on charges of religious conversion from November 2020 to July 31, 2024, and 1,682 people were arrested. Of these, only four cases have been convicted so far. The Deepika editorial also asks whether more evidence is needed to prove the misuse of the draconian ant-conversion act.