Tags:
Journalism of Courage
Call him on his cell phone and Tarseem Bharti startles the caller with a high-pitched 8220;Garv se kaho hum Hindu hain.8221; No, this is not Gujarat.
Bharti is among the 57 names announced by the BJP for the 65 seats that go to the polls in the second phase in Himachal Pradesh on December 19. His biggest triumph in the BJP8212;a party he joined eight years ago8212;is his 8216;Ghar Vapsi8221; mission, an anti-conversion drive. Bharti claims he has helped at least 2,700 people reconvert to Hindusim after they were 8216;forced8217; to convert to Christianity. Most of these families, he says, were poor Dalits. However passionate he may be about the subject, Bharti knows conversion can8217;t be an issue in the elections.
But why this shift? The BJP was instrumental in getting the Congress government to pass an anti-conversion law. In fact, Himachal is the only Congress-ruled state to pass such a law, which had evoked strong criticism from Christian organisations.
Governor V.S. Kokje has approved The Himachal Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act 2006, which was passed in the winter session of the Assembly in Dharamsala last year. It8217;s a different issue that the police haven8217;t registered a single case of religious conversion under this Act. Though most Congressmen are not aware of why Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh was compelled to pass the law, it now appears that by rushing through with it, the chief minister had actually robbed the BJP of an emotive election issue.
8220;We are happy if the BJP has decided to drop the issue,8221; says a Congress MLA loyal to Virbhadra Singh.
Meanwhile, the 10,000-odd Christians in the state will look at what forced the chief minister to pass the law.
