If the year 2008 appears to have been a particularly bad year for the Christian community in Karnataka, that is partly because the attacks were more intense, with a number of attacks taking place in a short space of time and were more severe, including instances of grievous injury; but partly also for other reasons as well: not only new and small churches with an evangelical agen- da but established ones too were attacked, and that too when the attention of the country was on the Sangh Parivar vis-à-vis Christian community, because of Orissa. However, the previous year did give some indication of what was to come.
Forty eight incidents of attacks on Christians have been counted in the year 2007, in districts as wide apart as Davangere, Bagalkot, Gulbarga, Hubli-Dharwar, Chitradurga, Dakshina Kannada, Kodagu, Mandya, Kolar, Udupi, Belgaum, Tumkur, Shimoga, Haveri, Bijapur, Hassan, Mysore, and Gadag, in addi- tion to the State capital, Bengaluru, which has seen the largest number of attacks. Almost all of these are physical attacks on pastors of small churches on the allegation of ‘conversions’. And in all the cases the attackers were of the Bajrang Dal, the Hindu Jagarana Vedike or Sri Rama Sene. It is evident that preaching per se is seen as conversion and punished by the guardians of Hinduism. Interestingly, while the Sangh Parivar sees the small unorganised churches which are more inclined to evangelism as vehicles of conversion - a veritable conspiracy of conversion - at least one person born into the Christian faith said to us that peo- ple are tired of organized religions of all faiths, which have become corrupt, and in the case of Christians, are reaching out to the unostentatious small churches. He says that this phenomenon has been evident for about ten years now. And some members of the Christian community said to us at Mangalore in an interac- tive session that they would have stood more firmly for their
rights if the leaders of the established churches (they pointed out specifically to the Bishops of the Catholic churches) had not been co-opted into the power structure of soci- ety, which made them soft-pedal the protest of the community. May we not conclude that the independence of the smaller churches which have not become part of the power structure and were therefore not manageable is one reason for the attacks on them in the name of their evangelism?
In comparison to 2007, the attacks in the year 2008 were massive. Twenty eight attacks took place at various places in the State between 17 August and 21 September, including 12 on a single day, the 14th of September, in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts. Though the New Life church and its objectionable propaganda literature was the ostensible reason for the attacks, only one of the twenty eight attacks, as said above, was on a New Life church. What was striking about these attacks, especially in Mangalore, is that the police acted in tandem with the Bajrang Dal. The pattern we observed was that the Bajrang Dal would attack Christian places and cause injury to per- sons and damage to property. Then the police would step in, not to chase and arrest the assailants, but ostensibly to prevent any violent retaliation by the Christians. And in the course of the alleged preventive activity, they would assault the Christians further. The premeditation and planning involved in the whole matter is evident if one follows the sequence of events carefully.
Kodical, a suburban locality of Mangalore city is one of the 12 places attacked simul- taneously on 14th September. As we entered the locality, we saw a big saffron-coloured banner hailing Lashmanananda Saraswati, strung across two trees. Kandhamal, it was evident, would not leave us. There is a CSI church in Kodical whose members are Tamils (dalits, apparently) who have settled here long ago. The 14th of September was a Sunday and prayers were scheduled for the afternoon. So there was no one in the small and homely church when a group of 30 to 35 persons, their faces covered with yellow cloth, came into the locality on motor cycles at 10-15 am. They attacked the church with iron pipes and cricket stumps and broke every thing that could be broken. As the shocked people gathered courage and came towards the church they sped away, raising slogans 'Jai Bajrang bali' and 'Bharat mata ki jai'. Strangely, even before the people could think of giving any complaint, a police team led by the Superintendent of Police came there. They cleaned up the damage without performing any inquest and took away the dam- aged material. Thus, they effectively suppressed the evidence.
Another place in Mangalore city attacked at the same time is the Adoration Center at Milagres. It is not a church, much less a proselytizing center. It is a place of prayer for cloistered nuns, who pray all the day. They go out only on two occasions: to hospital, when needed, and to vote at election time. At about 10-10 am, 15 to 16 persons came on motor cycles shouting 'Jai Bajrang bali' and 'Jai Shri Ram'. They carried lathis and their faces were covered. At that time there was a couple called Andrew and Irene in the