When India's new cabinet was sworn-in on Thursday, the loudest applause was for a little-known, frail-looking man. Pratap Chandra Sarangi was virtually unknown outside the state of Orissa (now Odisha), until he became a social media sensation this week. A picture of the austerely-clad man leaving his bamboo hut to take the oath won him hearts in India, where rags to riches stories always strike a chord. But despite his newfound popularity, Mr Sarangi has a chequered past. He was the leader of the Bajrang Dal, a hardline rightwing group, when a Hindu mob brutally killed Australian Christian missionary Graham Staines and his two children in 1999. Christian community leaders accused the Bajrang Dal of the killings, but an official inquiry found no evidence that any one group was behind the attack. After a lengthy trial, Dara Singh, a man with links to the group, and 12 others were convicted in 2003. But the high court in Orissa commuted a death sentence for Singh two years later. It also freed 11 others who were given life terms in prison, saying there was not enough evidence to support their convictions. Orissa-based journalist Sandeep Sahu says that Mr Sarangi has given several interviews, including to him, in which he spoke passionately against

In his second term, Narendra Modi assigned two ministerships of state to the Bharatiya Janata Party member who led locally the Bajrang Dal, a Hindu youth group involved in the death of the clergyman and his two sons. One of the members in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s cabinet has a chequered past. Pratap Chandra Sarangi was appointed Minister of State for Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries as well as Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. A largely unknown figure, Sarangi is a member of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from Odisha (Orissa). In the past, the “new Union minister was the coordinator of the Bajrang Dal when Graham Staines and his two kids were burnt alive” in 1999, said Sajan K George, president of the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC). The Bajrang Dal is a right-wing Hindu fundamentalist group. On the night of 22-23 January 1999, Hindu extremists set fire to the station wagon in which the Australian missionary and his two sons, Philip and Timothy (9 and 7 respectively), were sleeping, in Manoharpur, a village in Keonjhar district (Odisha). In 2006, Gladys Staines, the missionary’s widow, returned to live in the Indian state, together with her surviving daughter, Esther, to pursue her husband's work with lepers.

The child's parents are both blind and the father is a Pentecostal pastor. Together with his family, he was tortured in 2016 for alleged forced conversions. A court later acquitted his father. His mother, hopes her “son grows up loving and serving God." Ruben, a nine-year-old boy, was arrested, stripped, beaten and held in prison for three days when he was six only because he is a Christian. Both of his parents are blind and his father is a Christian pastor in Madhya Pradesh. The child is their eyes and hands, helping them out at home, helping them walk and move around. Despite his tender age, he had to suffer the blind violence of some Hindu radicals who abducted him along with his parents, for allegedly carrying out “forced conversions”. Ruben's nightmare is not unique. To commemorate and protect minors who suffer violence in war and peace, the United Nations in 1982 instituted the International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression, marking the observance on 4 June, today. Children are the most vulnerable group to conflicts and religious persecution. Ruben is the son of Rev Balu Saste and his wife Bhuri. The father is the pastor of the Pentecostal church in Badwani. In January 2016

Authorities seized 12 tearful, fatherless children from a Christian ministry in eastern India last month after local officials demolished the ministry’s school and hostel, sources said. After Hindu extremists persuaded the district collector to demolish the hostel and school serving 250 students, child protection personnel and police on May 21 seized the six orphans and six other children whose fathers were killed by communist guerrillas known as Naxalites, said Vijay Kumar Pusuru, who founded the school near the village of Lichapeta in Odisha state. “The children wept bitterly and pleaded, not wanting to depart,” Pusuru told Morning Star News. “They caught hold of branches and trees. But ruthlessly they were snatched and taken away.” The children and Pusuru’s family were living under a tree due to the destruction of their home along with the hostel on May 13. The 44-year-old Pusuru said the school, about 40 miles south of Malkangiri in the forests of Malkangiri District, is the only one in a radius of 62 miles (100 kilometers) providing English-language education. The district collector sent 50 people to demolish the school and hostel, which housed 100 children, along with Pusuru’s house, after a local leader of the Hindu extremist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) began

Christians in various villages of Chhattisgarh state, India are going hungry as members of tribal religions deprive them of work and refuse to sell food to them, sources said. In the southern tip of Chhattisgarh state, villagers who practice tribal religion of ancestor and nature worship attacked the homes of three Christian families in Bodiguda village, Sukma District on May 23, leaving 25 people homeless, including four infants. “Their homes are in ruins,” area pastor Philip Veeti told Morning Star News. “They dumped food grains sufficient to feed the Christians for the entire year in the drain. The families are hardly able to fill their stomachs with the limited provisions they have.” The villagers on that day warned the Christians to abandon their faith or face death, he said. When the three families refused, a mob of about 150 people tore down the tiled roofs of the three houses of the tribal Christians, throwing out their clothes and other belongings. The only breadwinners of the families, Sariam Virma, Kurram Desa and Panda Suba, fled to Injaram village 22 miles away, fearing for their lives, Pastor Veeti said. Their families in Bodiguda are living under the scanty shade of a Tamarind tree in temperatures that

A Catholic family in Jharkhand is awaiting justice for a tribal man, who was lynched by cow vigilantes in the eastern Indian state nearly two years ago, a lay leader says. The death of Ramesh Minj “did not enter the discourse of persecution of Christians,” bemoans John Dayal, general secretary of the All India Christian Council and president of the All India Catholic Union. “Christian NGOs were not involved.” Meanwhile, “the family is still waiting for justice,” the Catholic lay leader told AsiaNews. A mob of Hindu radicals beat 37-year-old Minj to death in August 2017. “Minj lived in Tingaru, a village in Palamu district, Jharkhand. He married Anita Minj ten years ago. The couple lived in the predominantly Christian Oraon village,” Dayal said, adding that the victim had many talents. During the sowing season, “he drove a tractor;” off season, “he drove a Bolero taxi.” Two years ago, “A mob of 120 people beat him for slaughtering a bullock.” Minj was eventually arrested and taken to the police station in Bhandaria. His wife managed to see him before he died in jail. She said he had a torn leg and his body was covered in bruises. Police indicted 17 people in connection with his

More than 432 Hindus became Buddhist at a public ceremony. Anti-conversion laws exist in seven Indian states. For Sajan K George, anti-Christian propaganda continues. At least 1,838 people changed religion in the last five years in Gujarat, this according to data released by state authorities. Of these, 1,735 were Hindus. Faced with these numbers, the president of a far-right Hindu nationalist group blamed Christian missionaries. "Christian missionaries are converting Hindus in the name of social services while the Muslims are doing so in the name of Love Jihad[*],” said Dilip Trivedi, president of the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) in North Gujarat, in an interview with the Times of India. “Conversion to Buddhism, Jainism or Sikh religion is not a conversion,” he added. “One can change panth (sect) in Sanatan Hindu religion but converting to Islam or Christianity does major damage to the religion. Their idea of nationhood also changes with their conversion.” According to Sajan K George, president of the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC), Trivedi’s comments must be "condemned because they create division among communities". Sadly, "in seven Indian states anti-conversion laws are in force," he explains, with serious penalties imposed on those who induce people to change religion through money and other means. Under such laws,

July 16, 2019. WASAHINGTON DC. (Corrected July 20) FIACONA appreciates the efforts of Secretary Pompeo and Ambassador At Large Sam Brownback for hosting the second annual global conference of Foreign Ministers in Washington from July 16 - 18, 2019 to advance religious freedom around the world. While FIACONA is greatly appreciative of the commitment the US Administration has for the rights of the people to practice their respective religious faiths without interference from state or non-state actors, we are disappointed that one of the largest violator of religious freedom in the world by sheer number of harassment and intimidation, India, is not on the published agenda of the conference. India's ruling Hindu nationalist party is behind almost all attacks against Christians and other religious minorities including the Dalits. Daily harassment of Christians by militia belonging to the ruling BJP party enjoys political protection of the Modi government. These protections are evident as in every case, victims are arrested by police instead of the attackers. Mr. Modi himself makes seemingly strong statements to alienate the office he is holding from such attacks carried out by his party. Statements issued by Mr. Modi condemning acts of violence against Christians and other religious minorities are for the sole purpose

Persecution of Christians in Bihar state, India, has so intensified in the past two years that Pastor Shelton Viswanathan didn’t dare call police after Hindu extremists broke bones in his hand and foot. “If I force the police to register cases against the assailants, the [Hindu extremist] Bajrang Dal’s top leaders will not spare me,” Pastor Viswanathan told Morning Star News. “The police officials asked me to be wary as the Hindu militant activists roam freely with guns, and through their videos, I can be easily identified by other RSS [Hindu extremist umbrella group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh]-affiliated groups also.” Violence against Christians in Bihar state, in India’s northeast bordering Nepal and Bangladesh, has increased in the past two years, sources said. Hopes for forming a Christian response center with help from legal aid and relief organizations has yet to be realized, Devesh Lal of the Bihar Pastors Fellowship told Morning Star News. “The Hindutva [Hindu nationalist] extremists are walking into churches and are disrupting prayer services – on a weekly basis, we hear of threats and attacks on home churches and pastors,” Lal said. “Christian persecution is widely spread across Bihar, and it appears to be a much planned, systematic opposition created to target activities.” Like

The Hindu nationalists shouting at Christian leaders who were summoned to a police station in southern India asked what gave them the right to lead Christian congregations in a Hindu country. “Who gave you the permission to run a church in a Hindu country?” they shouted, falsely accusing the three church leaders in Muthapudupet, in the metropolitan area of Chennai, Tamil Nadu, of using foreign funds to convert Hindus, according to the son of one of the pastors, who was also present. The approximately 200 Hindu nationalists were waiting for Ekklesia Pentecostal Blessing Church’s pastor Sekar, who goes by a single name, pastor Paul Kumaran of Yengaraja Yesuraja Church and church leader Pandari Bai of Grace Home Church after they were summoned to the T8 Muthapudupet police station on July 5. “They shouted at us and were issuing threats that they will demolish Christian buildings,” Pastor Sekar’s son, Livingston Sekar, told Morning Star News. “They were screaming aggressively, and my father cautioned that we should not have a fight there.” Leaders of the Hindu nationalist Hindu Makkal Katchi party (Hindu People’s Party) warned them that there should be no Christian worship in the area, Sekar said. “Pray only with your family, your own brother and