The Indian government has released an ambitious education policy aiming to transform the country's learning system to match global standards, generating mixed reactions from church officials. The federal cabinet approved the National Education Policy 2020 on July 29, replacing a 34-year policy. The policy was in the making for more than six years and the first draft was released in 2016. The process to formulate a new policy was accelerated soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pro-Hindu party came to power in 2014. Officials of the Catholic Church, which claims to be managing the largest network of educational institutions in the country after the government, were reserved in their comments, saying they need time to study the policy in depth. However, "generally it looks very positive and beneficial to the changed global scenario," said Archbishop Thomas D'Souza of Kolkata,… Read more at: https://international.la-croix.com/news/education/church-officials-wary-about-indias-new-education-policy/12860#

Pastor Ramnivas Kumar had been attacked before, but in the latest instance he was stunned that police in eastern India arrested his bleeding guests based on transparently false accusations that they were robbers, he said. Christians Avinash Kumar and Rambali Ram were visiting Pastor Kumar’s home in Ranjitpur village, Bihar state on July 13 with two Hindu friends who had met them on the way from their fields in Sitamarhi District and requested the pastor pray for them, the church leader said. The two Hindus had told their two Christian friends they wanted the pastor to tell them the story of Jesus and to pray for them, he said. As he and the four guests chatted over tea, Pastor Kumar asked if recent flooding had affected their harvests, explained the gospel to the Hindus and began praying for them, he said. “As I was praying, we heard the neighbors shouting at us from the main door,” Pastor Kumar told Morning Star News. “They were hurling abuses at me, accusing me of accepting a foreign faith and following a foreign God.” He and the two Christian guests went out to ask why they had intruded onto his property and were using filthy language against him

It is yet another anti-Christian attack in the country. Rajesh Gupta's wife is in hospital with a fractured hand and leg. In June, an educational center run by a Christian organization was attacked. Two weeks ago, extremists killed a pastor in Punjab. Sajan K George: The faithful live in terror. Hindu radicals brutally attacked Pentacostal pastor Rajesh Gupta and his family in Faridabad (Haryana). The attack, carried out with sharp weapons, took place yesterday morning while Rajesh was reciting a prayer in the home of a faithful. The pastor and his family were then rescued and taken to hospital for treatment. His wife is hospitalized with a fractured hand and leg. It is the second anti-Christian incident to occur this year in Faridabad. On June 20, Hindu fundamentalists raided and occupied an educational center in the city district. The facility, managed by the Karuna Welfare Society, belongs to the Grace Assembly of God Church in Faridabad. The extremists placed a statue of a Hindu deity inside. Groups of Hindu radicals have targeted Christian faithful in other parts of the country. On July 27, Balwinder “Bagicha” Bhatti, another Protestant pastor, was found dead by the side of a road near Ferozpur (Punjab). Victim of

A Christian father of seven in northern India was hospitalized for more than two weeks after Hindu extremists with iron rods interrupted his night prayers with his family and beat him at his home. Pappu Kumar, released from a hospital on Thursday (Aug. 13), was praying with his family in Balawali village, Uttarakhand state at 9:30 p.m. on July 28 when a mob of at least 10 Hindu extremists appeared at his door, sources said. The visitors told the 40-year-old Kumar, who put his faith in Christ just three months ago, to stop praying, said Mange Singh, a church pastor in the region who has been discipling Kumar’s family. “Pappu responded that he was praying inside his house, and that should not bother anybody,” Pastor Singh said. “But the furious mob began to assault Pappu.” The mob verbally abused Kumar as they kicked him and beat him with the rods, batons and fists, repeatedly telling him to stop following the Christian faith, Pastor Singh said. “They intentionally threw Pappu on the heap of bricks that were placed near his house, so that they would cause him double injury,” he said. Kumar sustained a severe head injury, a broken leg and fractured bones in his hand in

India have threatened to arrest Christians for “disturbing the peace” if their worship draws more opposition after recent attacks, including one that has nearly cost an elderly woman her sight, sources said. Complaining that Christian prayers have driven away their nature-based gods, tribal animists in Badaguda, Odisha state have repeatedly attacked 12 families since the Christians left their traditional religion two years ago. The 55 to 60 Christians in Koraput District have been sheltering together each night for the past six months, fearful of more assaults after villagers burned their makeshift church structure in March and beat men, women and children on July 21. “The 12 Christian families have faced opposition almost every day since the day they decided to follow the Christian faith,” said their pastor, Ayub Khora, whose wife added that rarely a day goes by without church members facing verbal or physical abuse. Two villagers assaulted a Christian family at 1 a.m. on July 21 and vandalized their home, only to attack again at 8 a.m. with about 100 others who came to the house where they had taken shelter and beat members of the 12 Christian families with wooden planks, Pastor Khora said. Kanduru Muduli, 55, said that his son,

Harassment of Christians by hard-line Hindus in northern India ended in police coercing a pastor to agree to stop holding worship in his home after an officer threatened to make false charges against his son, he said. The pastor said the coercion by police in Uttar Pradesh state came after his son, 19-year-old Pawan Kumar, on Aug. 25 asked intoxicated Hindus to stop yelling disparaging remarks about Christianity outside their home in Tarkulwa village, Maharajganj District. “The officers at Shyam Deurwa police station joined hands with the assailants and forced us to sign a document vowing that we would never conduct prayers in our home, and that we would not share gospel with anyone,” the house-church leader, identified only as Pastor Sugriv, told Morning Star News. “I was forced to sign it. What kind of justice is this?” On the night of the triggering incident, the group of Hindus were on the verge of attacking but in their drunken state ended up fighting among themselves, he said. He took his son back inside and locked the door to the Hindus’ taunts of, “Hallelujah, Hallelujah,” which continued into the night, Pastor Sugriv said. The next morning he informed the Tarkulwa village president about the harassment,

Catholic devotees wear face mask attend the Holy Mass at the Saint Joseph's Church on the first day after the reopening of religious services after the government eased restrictions imposed as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus, in Hyderabad on June 8, 2020. | NOAH SEELAM/AFP via Getty Images Amid another crackdown on foreign aid, India has canceled six Christian organizations’ licenses to receive donations from outside the country in a move some say is little more than a “shakedown” by the Hindu nationalist party. According to a report from UCA News, New Life Fellowship Association, Evangelical Churches Association of Manipur, Ecreosoculis North Western Gossner Evangelical, and Northern Evangelical Lutheran Church have all had their licenses canceled under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act.  John Prabhudoss, chairman of the Federation of Indian American Christian Organizations of North America, told The Christian Post that two additional Christian charities — Rajnandgaon Leprosy Hospital (A member of the Christian Medical Association of India) and the DonBosco Tribal Development Society — also lost their licenses to accept foreign funds.  Without these licenses, the Christian organizations will be unable to legally receive donations from outside India, hindering their ability to carry out their evangelistic ministries.  “From time to time, relevant matters concerning FCRA

An Indian man walks outside a deserted church, as India remains under an unprecedented extended lockdown over the highly contagious coronavirus (COVID-19) on May 5, 2020, in Delhi, India. Getty Images/Yawar Nazir A Christian pastor in northern India was forced to sign papers renouncing all religious activity — including sharing the Gospel or holding worship in his home — after a police officer threatened to file false charges against him and his teenage son. A house church pastor identified only as Pastor Sugriv told Morning Star News that the threats by police in Uttar Pradesh state came after his son, 19-year-old Pawan Kumar, asked intoxicated Hindu extremists to stop making offensive comments about Christianity outside their home in Tarkulwa village, Maharajganj District. "The officers at Shyam Deurwa police station joined hands with the assailants and forced us to sign a document vowing that we would never conduct prayers in our home, and that we would not share the Gospel with anyone," he said. "I was forced to sign it. What kind of justice is this?" The night of the first incident, drunk Hindu extremists reportedly shouted "Hallelujah, hallelujah" outside the Christians' home. Though police initially ordered the Hindus to stop harassing the pastor and his family, they

Members of the Yuva Shakti Sangathan accuse a Christian clergyman of trying to convert hundreds of Hindus. Rev Santosh Kannaujia denies the allegations. Local Christians gather only to pray. For the Global Council of Indian Christians, Hindu radicals think Indian Christians are second-class citizens. Varanasi (AsiaNews) – Hindu extremists from the Yuva Shakti Sangathan attacked a small Pentecostal community in Bela, a village in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, terrorising its members last Sunday. Speaking to AsiaNews, Sajan K. George, president of the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC), said that a dozen of Hindu extremists, associated with Hindutva, a pan-Hindu extremist ideology, went to the home of Santosh Kannaujia, a local Pentecostal clergyman. The extremists accused him of trying to convert Hindus to Christianity in the nearby village of Cholapur. Santosh was defended by members of his community; the police intervened to stop the row, making arrests on both sides. According to Praveen Dubey, head of Yuva Shakti Sangathan, Santosh attempted to convert hundreds of people; the pastor denied the allegations saying that local Christians only gather to pray. The GCIC firmly condemned the action of the radical Hindu group, which caused clashes by disseminating false information. George slammed extremist groups that operate in the

A voice vote would be acceptable if there was a near-consensus. But for the controversial farm bills, the Rajya Sabha should have voted using a division. Sunday saw chaos in the Rajya Sabha as the three critical bills on the agricultural sector were up for vote. The scope of the legislation is vast, opening up India’s tightly-regulated farming sector as well as agricultural marketing to free market forces. Supporters of the move have called it a “1991 moment” – referring to the moment many regulations on private industry were abolished by Prime Minister Naramsimha Rao. Critics, however, have argued that these new agricultural policies will lead to farmers losing out on guaranteed purchase prices for their crops, to the benefit of large corporations. Whichever side of the fence one chooses, there is no denying that the legislations are very important for crores of India’s farmers. In that light, how two of the bills were passed in the Rajya Sabha on Sunday was deeply problematic. The third bill is also scheduled to be moved in the Upper House. All three bills have already been passed by the Lok Sabha. Amidst chaos, as the Opposition protested the bills, the telecast was muted, cutting off viewers from what