Christian missionaries emboldened by Sonia becoming Cong president, says VHP

He lauded Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s call for a nationwide debate on conversions and wondered why the Congress, the Janata Dal and Left were running scared of it. “After all, debate and dialogue are a vital element of democracy,” he said.

Calling for a complete ban on conversions, the VHP secretary-general claimed that the Indian Constitution did not confer the right to convert people to a faith.“According to Article 25 (1), practising, professing or propagating one’s faith is not absolute, but subject to public order, morality or health,” he said. This, he added, was upheld by the Supreme Court in its judgement delivered in 1977.

The Niyogi Committee report of 1954 had also, according to him, established that the Christian missionaries used force, fraud and allurement to convert innocent people, that the educational and health institutions run by them were used for this purpose that a feeling of separatism was being fanned by them to form a different state on the lines of Pakistan.

Togadia charged the church with inducing separatist tendencies across the country, as was visible in their activities in the North-East. “Religion-based separatism has already caused havoc in provinces such as Sindh, Baluchistan, Punjab, Bangladesh and Jammu and Kashmir,” he said.

He said trouble in the Dangs district had been triggered off by the Christian missionaries. “The struggle there is between thechurch and the vanvasis. There is an attempt to divide the family, village and the society on the lines of Christian’ and non-Christian’,” he alleged.

The VHP secretary-general also demanded an investigation into the funds obtained from abroad by the Christian missionaries. “These funds are being used not just to propagate religion but also to interfere in the political process,” Togadia observed.