Orissa's saffron fire

 

 

Rural Orissa is completely in the grip of the communal monster as the traditional rivalry between Scheduled Caste Panas and tribal Kandhas have taken the form of Hindu Christian imbroglio, and the fire has been suitably stoked by police officials who, some allege, are Christians. In hindsight, the murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati acted as the mere trigger while the dry twigs had been piling up and ready for the inferno to take shape. With 11 dead so far, and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad on the rampage, the Christian community's call for the army to protect them has finally happened with the army flag march in Kandhamal.

The Swami, a VHP leader who has been a bulwark against the rampant conversion to Christianity, and seer of the Chakapad Ashram of Kandhamal, was conducting Janmashtami rituals on August 23 at the Jaleshpeta Ashram. Police said that Maoists attacked the ashram and killed him. Interestingly, a majority of the Orissa Maoist ranks are Panas, a community that is almost 70 per cent converted to Christianity, and they had been the targets of the VHP. Naturally, the latter found it convenient to ignore the Maoist angle and blamed Christians, attacking them across the state. Sources say that Bajrang Dal and VHP zealots had been waiting for this, or something like this. They held that middle ranking police officials were Christians and had ensured that the ashram remained unprotected that night. The sacrificial lamb, of course, had to be the district police super Vinay Kanoria, who was asked to step down ‘on moral grounds'.

But while the city dwellers are fed up with this communal frenzy, the embers of which never died down after Dara Singh lit the fire that consumed the Steins, the rural areas are ablaze, and there is no denying that it is a state-wide issue now. In Padmapur, almost 200 kilometres away from Kandhamal, a college student was burnt alive, for she, a Pana, had converted to Christianity to ensure that her college fees are taken care of.

Churches across the state were attacked. And the Catholic Bishops Conference of India demanded: “If the state cannot ensure the safety of the citizens, the central government should deploy the armed forces there.”

The worst affected district is Khandhamal, where scores of churches were set ablaze on August 25. One person was burnt alive in Rupagaon when an irate mob set afire a Christian village. The victim was ailing and unable to move and was trapped in the blaze. But the inhuman incidents in Bargarh district crossed all limits. A Christian priest of an orphanage for women was locked inside a room and set on fire by a VHP-Bajrang Dal mob. The priest’s pleas were ignored by the mob, which ransacked the hostel completely. The head of the orphanage, Father Eddy, became senseless, but he was rescued by the police. But a 19-year-old woman was trapped in the fire and burnt alive!

The outrage and demand for action against Orissa government has been nationwide, and even the Bharatiya Janata Party, coalition partner in the state government, has joined in, not to stop the communal situation, but because a Hindu priest has been killed. Not strange, when the roots of the VHP and Bajrang Dal are the same as that of the BJP, and observers say that the day is not far when Orissa will outstrip all other states in its fiery communal orgies!