Church watches anxiously as Indian election begins
Today saw the first of five rounds in India‘s latest general election, the largest exercise of democracy in the world. Results, expected on 16 May, will determine which party or coalition of parties will be chosen to govern for the next five years. Analysts say the race is too close to call.
Although Christians make up only some three percent of India’s overall population, in some areas their votes could be decisive.
The Church plays a crucial role in several Christian pockets, especially in Kerala, Goa and some northeastern states. The election comes at a time when Christians are facing challenges from governments and religious fundamentalists in various places.
In the southern state of Kerala, Church leaders are at odds with ruling communists, whose government they claim is trying to smother Christians. Media have accused Kerala-based Cardinal Varkey Vithayathil of Ernakulam-Angamaly, president of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of India, of saying in his recently published biography that communists are a greater evil than the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, Indian People’s Party).
However, Christians in the eastern state of Orissa, where Hindu radicals waged seven weeks of anti-Christian violence beginning last August, have identified the BJP as the force to defeat. The party, which supports a Hindu nationalist ideology, was part of the two-party coalition that ruled the state during the violence. When that alliance split on March 7, Archbishop Raphael Cheenath of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar, head of the Catholic Church in the state, said he was happy.
Beginning last August, Orissa was the scene of widespread and pre-planned anti-Christian mob violence.
This year India jumped from No. 30 to No. 22 on Open Doors’ World Watch List of countries where Christians suffer the most severe persecution. The increased violence is driven by rising anger among Hindu extremists over Christian conversions and the growth of Christianity. Some Hindus charge that the conversions are forced on poor Indians, mostly the lower-caste Dalits, by Christian missionaries. Five states in India have passed anti-conversion laws and two more states are preparing to implement laws.
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Since August in Orissa more than 60 Christians have been killed, 252 churches and 1,500 homes razed or destroyed and an estimated 50,000 Christians displaced. Around 1,500 Christians are still living in refugees camps — and living in fear. Open Doors is partnering with organizations to help the displaced with basic food supplies and medicines.Abhishek Singh, the director of Open Doors in India, expects persecution to continue to increase in India.
Persecution watchdog organisation Open Doors has initiated a prayer campaign for India and the Christians who live there. A three-page backgrounder with prayer items is posted here. This is the prayer campaign video:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoijxxIw6f0[/youtube]
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty calls this “the world’s most important election”, of even greater significance than last November’s US election.
[A]n election [is] pending which will have far more important economic impact on the fate of mankind, causing a fifth of the world’s population either to remain mired in poverty, or to move rapidly toward economic growth and prosperity. That election is in India.
Read the whole thing for analysis of the economic policies and electoral prospects of the various parties.
BBC News has posted a detailed map with brief state-by-state election previews.