The way Christians in India are subjected to torture and persecution is atrocious. Their only fault is practising their religious beliefs and abiding by the country's Constitution.

Now they are wondering if this is secular India. Men of conscience across religions question if this is secular India with a secular Constitution.

Over time, ever since the Bharatiya Janata Party captured power, particularly under Mr Modi, the minions of the Sangh Parivar got emboldened to ride roughshod over Indian minorities. Muslims have long been targeted as aliens. They were subjected to atrocious treatment, abusive language and unparliamentary descriptions.

Their shops were boycotted and gutted; they were denied access to places where Hindus lived. They were lynched and murdered for taking their cows to their farms. The unruly mobs were given a free hand to execute the RSS agenda with a vengeance, as it were. Sangh Parivar stalwarts and RSS politicians supported them with a free licence.

Some state governments employed bulldozers to pull down their shops and residences.

The Scheduled Caste community has been the victim of abuse and mistreatment all along. We have reports of even an upper-caste judge conducting a purification ceremony with Gangajal in his judicial chamber because the previous occupant was a Dalit.

The incident is as follows: The Additional District and Sessions Judge in Uttar Pradesh, Bharthari Prasad — who belonged to a Scheduled Caste — was transferred, and his chamber was subsequently taken over by another judge, Ashok Kumar Srivastava. Newspaper reports emerged stating that Srivastava had the entire chamber and its furniture washed with Ganga jal (Ganga water) to "purify" it because it had previously been occupied by Prasad.

The most recent "shuddhikaran" (purification) ritual performed at the Ramlila Maidan in Haldwani, Uttarakhand, has evoked national and international outrage and condemnation. The controversy revolves around Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, a prominent Dalit leader, addressing a Congress party rally on August 8, 2026, at Ramlila Ground in Haldwani. Two days later, members of a right-wing group, the Shri Ram Sena Dharmarth Seva Nyas, conducted a purification ritual ("havan" and the sprinkling of Gangajal) on the stage and at the venue.

In fact, such an act is not surprising when the right-wing groups are clamouring for rewriting the Constitution to replace it with Manusmriti and the Vedas.

The indigenous Adivasis are told to shun their age-old religion and follow Hindu rituals and become Hindus if they have to live in India. They are told that since Lord Ram lived as a vanvasi in the forest for a time, the Adivasis, who live close to the forest, are Ram's followers, vanvasis, and hence Hindus.

Those Adivasis who have become Muslims and Christians of their own free will are treated as pariahs, ostracised, beaten or thrown out of their villages. They are denied even burial rights.

And, of late, violence against Christians has taken a crucial turn. In BJP-ruled states, with anti-conversion laws in operation, violent mobs are emboldened to gatecrash into Christian prayer meetings, attack Christians with rods, destroy Christian statues, and vandalise and desecrate sacred sanctuaries. Tribal-dominated central Indian states like Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, and Chhattisgarh are the worst affected.

With the enthronement of the BJP government in West Bengal, hooligans are attacking convents, schools, prayer centres and even burial places. Even the police dance to the diktat of these terrorist mobs, and remain silent and inactive in the face of violence.

Christians, being a peaceful and nonviolent community, do not react but remain silent lambs led to slaughter. They are helpless. But one thing the Christian leaders have to remember is that human lives are precious and cannot be allowed to be played like football.

The land and property belonging to the Church are not cheap objects to be vandalised by antisocial mobs. They need to be protected, duty-bound by Church authorities. They have the responsibility to see that Christians are not allowed to be slaughtered. The blood of Christians will cry for retribution over their persecutors and even over their religious leaders for abandoning them.

Let not the good shepherds hide their heads when their followers are attacked by wolves.

Just presenting memoranda to a non-responsive government or conducting pussy-footed inter-religious dialogue will not yield any result. Such soap operas are not a solution. A nationwide demonstration by all Christian denominations will create a wave, and the world will begin to ask questions. But the big question is, will our leaders dare to do it? Many of them are happy educating the children of the elite and of the persecutors and holding on to their power connections. Those running elite institutions remain immune to the down-to-earth issues of common people.

In the case of the late Jesuit priest Fr. Stan Swamy, I had proposed to the Jesuit higher-ups to have a day of solidarity with Fr. Stan, who was rotting in jail, by closing our institutions for a day. The proposal was later referred to an expert committee, and it got flushed down the commode.

Now the same forces are clamouring to declare Stan a saint!

We should know that our Constitution guarantees every citizen the right to self-defence. We need to protect the lives of our people. We need to protect our holy places, institutions and properties. That should mean that we have the constitutionally guaranteed right to self-defence with the help of defence groups.

Every Church and every institution should organise community volunteer forces to peacefully defend our people and assets. Remember that, more than bishops, priests and nuns, it is the people who become victims of violence and persecution.

Churches and institutions are not private assets of Church leaders but are community assets. They need to be protected and handed over to future generations.

If the leaders do not act with a committed conscience, Jesus Christ will come with a whip to clear them off the elite stables on Church premises.