International opinion

New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who faced tough questions over violence against Christians in Orissa and Karnataka during his visit to France, told his Cabinet colleagues on Friday that the incidents in these States had affected the image of the country.
At a Cabinet meeting here, the Prime Minister mentioned how he faced embarrassing questions over the incidents during his meetings with the leaders of the U.S. and European Union, official sources said.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is the current head of the 27-nation European, raised the issue of attacks on Christians in Orissa and Karnataka during his meeting with Dr. Singh in Marseilles earlier this week. He described these incidents as “massacre” against Christians.
Facing such embarrassment, Dr. Singh termed these violent incidents as a “national shame.” — PTI

stop

Stop the violence against Christians
The continuing large-scale violence targeting Christians in Orissa’s Kandhamal district is indicative of a constitutional breakdown in the area. More than a month after organised violence broke out in the wake of the August 23 murder of an anti-conversion Hindutva activist, Swami Lakshmanananda, by suspected Maoist elements, the district continues to be out of bounds for the secular Constitution and the rule of law. Numerous atrocities have been committed — inc luding murder, rape, arson, assaults on Christians, their churches, and service institutions, the intimidation of Dalits to make them give up the Christian faith, and the conversion of large numbers of people into refugees. This reign of terror, which has been reported in depth and with fresh detail in the columns of The Hindu, calls for the strongest action by the State government. Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik professes modernity and secularism but his Biju Janata Dal is locked in a political alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party. In consequence, the coalition’s response to the crisis has been worse than inept. If it is to regain credibility, the State government must act urgently to stop the semi-fascist attacks carried out by extremist saffron organisations. It must protect the people and places targeted, restore public order in Kandhamal district, ensure the safe return of the internally displaced, and enforce the rule of law. At another level, the situation calls for effective intervention by the Central government. Up to this point, it has done precious little to stop the mischief, with its Article 355 advisories failing to have any effect on the ground. As many as 77 companies of Central paramilitary forces are available to the State government but it has avoided their effective deployment to act against the thugs and protect their target. Now, after enormous damage has been done, the Central Cabinet has bestirred itself over the “very grave situation” and Home Minister Shivraj Patil has issued a stern warning to the Patnaik government.
What is evident from the published accounts of the victims, clerical and lay, is that in several instances the police have watched the atrocities in silence. They have refused to register cases — even when the crime was murder — on the basis of complaints made by the affected families. Such extreme indifference suggests complicity of a dangerous political kind. So bad was the situation that the Orissa High Court had to direct the Superintendent of Police of Kandhamal to take stringent action against policemen found sympathising with the rioters. The rape of a 28-year-old nun and the brutal assault of a priest on August 25 at K. Nuagaon took place in front of a police outpost. It was only after the media began to focus on this shocking case that it was handed over to the State police’s Crime Branch, four persons were arrested, and the inspector in charge of the Baliguda police station was placed under suspension. Unfortunately, under the circumstances, there will be little confidence that any arm of the State police can uphold the law, free from political interference. In the interest of an objective and speedy investigation, pressure must be brought on the State government to hand over the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation; if this fails, the higher judiciary can be approached through a petition seeking the transfer of the case, by court order, to the CBI. Equally important, tough disciplinary action must be taken against senior police officers guilty of dereliction of duty. This will send out a salutary signal and help turn the situation around.

Anti christian

Orissa Crime Branch to probe nun’s rape
Only a CBI investigation can bring the guilty to book: Archbishop Raphael Cheenath of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar
BHUBANESWAR: Bowing to building political and media pressure to take action against those guilty of the rape of a nun in K. Nuagaon village in Kandhamal district on August 25, the Orissa government ordered on Friday an investigation by the Crime Branch into the incident, on which a case was registered under Section 376 and other sections of the Indian Penal Code.
The government has suspended the Inspector in charge of the Baliguda police station where the nun had filed her complaint. It has also arrested four accused in the case, although the principal accused, the man who raped the nun, is still at large, the Kandhamal district Superintendent of Police, Praveen Kumar, said.
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik told a news channel on Friday that “stringent action” would be taken against the “shameful incident” of the nun’s rape.
For many Christian organisations, whose clergy and followers have been under sustained attack in Kandhamal district since December 2007, and particularly after the murder of the VHP leader Lakshmanananda Saraswathi by Maoists on August 23, this announcement by the State government is action too little too late. They want the government to hand this case, and other cases of communal atrocities, to the Central Bureau of Investigation for investigation and prosecution.
“If the State government is interested in bringing the guilty to book, why is it not handing over the case to the CBI?” asked Archbishop of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar Raphael Cheenath. Criticising the State government’s handling of the situation, he told The Hindu that the case relating to the murder of Lakshmanananda Saraswathi, the upsurge of communal violence that followed, and the case of the nun’s rape should all be handed over to the CBI. It is a demand that Swarupananda Patra, President of the Orissa Minority Forum, supports. “We cannot expect a fair probe by the Crime Branch,” he told this newspaper.
Dazed and terrified, the victims of the violence and of the attempts at forced conversion (to Hinduism) that these attacks are invariably followed by, stream into the relief camps with nothing but the clothes they wear. According to the State government, there are 14,000 persons living in government relief camps in Kandhamal. This figure is contested by Christian groups. Archbishop Cheenath told The Hindu that the number of displaced people from Kandhamal is actually close to 40,000.
“We had to leave our homes after some 100 people came to our village at night and threatened to kill us if we continued to live as Christians,” Royal Kumar Nayak, a resident of Malikapaudi village who is now in the YMCA relief camp at Bhubaneshwar, told The Hindu. Meanwhile, peace eludes Kandhamal district, with each day bringing reports of fresh cases of violence by Hindutva organisations against Christians.

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Government sponsored in Atrocities India (Orissa )

unopened white envelopes, soiled and crumpled, with the acknowledgement due slip affixed, addressed to the officer-in-charge, Baliguda police station, Kandhamal district, with a scribbled noting by the postman that reads: “Address refused. Have returned back.”
In them are two written complaints, the first by Ravindra Pradhan (35) on the killing of his physically challenged brother, Roshanand Pradhan, by a Hindutva mob on the night of August 24, and the second by his niece, Ashwini Pradhan, on the burning of her house by the same mob.
Sent to the OIC of the Baliguda police station by registered post, it was refused by him and returned to them by post. Both letters mention the names of those who committed the crimes. The incident took place at Rupagaon village in the Baliguda sub-division. “When we heard the attackers entering, we ran around 200 metres to the nearby field, but my brother being a cripple could not run. I saw the incident with my own eyes, and mentioned the names of those responsible in my complaint,” Mr. Pradhan told. He is now in a relief camp run by the Young Men’s Christian Association in Bhubaneswar with 12 members of his family. He said his brother told the family to run and not worry about his safety as the attackers, who were from the same village, knew him and would not attack a physically challenged person.
“We brought this to the notice of the Governor when he came to the relief camp, but we have heard nothing further. We have not even been able to go back to the village to perform the last rites for my brother,” said Motilal Pradhan, father of Ashwini and serving army jawan, who has fought in Kargil. All 38 Christian homes in the village were burnt, but not before they were looted of valuables by the mob.
This is one of the four specific incidents of violence in Kandhamal that was brought to the notice of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Thursday by a fact-finding team comprising P.C. Thomas, Member of Parliament, and V. Surendran Pillai, Member of the Kerala Assembly, both of the Kerala Congress (Joseph).
The other incidents that the delegation has asked the Chief Minister to act on with the utmost urgency, Mr. Thomas told , the killing of RSS leader Lakshmanananda Saraswathi on August 23, the rape of a nun and attack on a priest at Nuagaon village on August 25, and the murder of Divyalochan Digan, a pastor, on August 25. In the last case, the attackers came to the house of the pastor after they had killed him, and, after informing his wife Pushpanjali and their 11-year-old daughter, Mona Lisa, of the murder, proceeded to douse them with kerosene to set them alight. On the pleading of the distraught family, they let them off, but burnt the house.
What is common in three of the four incidents is that there are eyewitnesses ready to give evidence on the precise identity of the killers. “The Chief Minister told us that a few persons have been arrested in connection with Lakshmanananda Saraswathi’s murder. A whole community is in the dock for his murder, and it is imperative that the killers be apprehended if the violence is to stop,” Mr. Thomas said.
“We also told him that the middle level leaders who are giving leadership to the atrocities in Kandhamal must be arrested,” he said.
The team was not able to go to Kandhamal because the district was now curfew-bound. “The Chief Minister promised that he would take immediate action on all four cases. If nothing is done, then I will raise it in the next session of the Lok Sabha,” Mr. Thomas said. He said his party had already demanded of the Prime Minister that a Central Bureau of Investigation probe be ordered into the Kandhamal violence. He has also formally asked the Speaker to constitute a parliamentary delegation to visit Kandhamal. Police assurance
State Director-General of Police Manmohan Praharaj told that anyone who left his home on being affected by the communal violence and was living elsewhere could send his complaint by post to the Kandhamal Superintendent of Police.
The Kandhamal police would verify the matter and if a case was made out a formal case would be registered in the police station concerned, Mr. Praharaj said.
If it was found that a case had already been registered on the basis of a complaint filed by any of the relatives of the persons sending their complaints by post, they would be informed of it by the Kandhamal police, the DGP added.
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Stop anti- Christian violence

Amnesty: stop anti-Christian violence
LONDON: Amnesty International has urged the Indian Government to “match its words with action” and ensure that violence against Christians in Orissa stops.
In a statement here on Thursday, it said that despite Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s statement that what was happening in Orissa was a “national shame” and that his Government had taken firm action to halt it, Christians in the state continued to face attacks.
“The last two days have witnessed renewed attacks by supporters of Hindu nationalist organizations, including Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal, against the Christian minorities and their places of worship in Kandhamal district in Orissa, leaving three people dead, more than 15 people injured, including some policemen, and hundreds homeless,” it said adding that Amnesty volunteers had spoken to people who confirmed that an atmosphere of insecurity prevailed.
Amnesty also called for adequate security for relief camps and an impartial inquiry into the attacks.

100houses burnt

Although no incident was reported from Kandhamal district of Orissa on Thursday, more than 100 houses were burnt down in the neighbouring Boudh district.
Police, however, claimed that the attacks in Kandhamal block of Boudh during the early hours of the day was not communal in nature, but ethnic in which Kondh tribals attacked houses of Dalit Panas.
Director General of Police (DGP) Manmohan Praharaj said security forces were being sent to Kandhamal.
The administration was expecting a backlash in Kandhamal following the arrest of 45 persons, including some leaders of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Kui Samaj, on Tuesday and Wednesday. However, there was no protest till Thursday evening. Meanwhile, the DGP visited several riot-hit areas of Kandhamal, including G. Udayagiri and Raikia blocks, to assess the situation.
In another development, curfew was relaxed in nine towns of Kandhamal district from 5 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The district administration, however, cancelled a district level peace rally which was to be held at Phulbani, the district headquarters town of Kandhamal.
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Rape of nun confirmed

Rape of nun confirmed
Medical examination done at Baliguda government hospital
BHUBANESWAR: medical examination conducted on the 28-year-old Catholic nun, who was sexually assaulted at K. Nuagaon in Kandhamal district on August 25, has confirmed she was raped.
“The medical examination report suggests that the nun was raped,” District Superintendent of Police Praveen Kumar told The Hindu over phone from Phulbani on Thursday.
The nun, along with a Catholic priest, was publicly beaten up by a mob and she was raped in a nearby building when anti-Christian violence was at its peak in Kandhamal in the wake of the killing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Lakshmanananda on August 23.
The medical examination was done at the Sub-Divisional government hospital at Baliguda.
The rape case, registered under 376 and other Sections of the IPC, is being investigated under the supervision of a Deputy Superintendent of Police. Senior police officials are also monitoring the progress of the investigation, Mr. Kumar said.
The Kandhamal police are also making efforts to contact the nun, who left the district along with the priest, Father Thomas Chellan, after filing her complaint with the Baliguda police.
No one has been arrested in the rape case so far. “The Baliguda police are trying to ascertain the identity of the accused persons,” Mr. Kumar said.
In her complaint, the nun said she was ill-treated by a group of 30 to 40 persons and one from among them raped her. “We are trying our best to solve the case,” he said.
Sister Nirmala, Superior General of the Missionaries of Charity, who is here, on being informed of the result of the medical examination, told The Hindu: “I am satisfied that they have established this and hope the investigation will proceed.”
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