Somappa Rayappa Bommai is more than a footnote in the constitutional history of India. A founder of the Janata Party, he was Chief Minister of Karnataka in 1988-89 when his government was dismissed by the Centre. He fought back in the Supreme Court, ultimately wresting a judgment, now known as the Bommai case, which strengthened the political autonomy of states, and placed strong restrictions on the Union government to impose President’s rule at the whim of the party that ruled in New Delhi. Bommai was also known for his commitment to the cause of secularism and harmony between communities.

His son, Basavaraj Somappa Bommai, who had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party, became the Chief Minister in July 2021; he possibly wants to go down in history as the man who polarised  the region as no one else had done in 300 years. He has promised to enact a law against religious conversions in the state which, the extreme militant segments of the BJP and its parent Rastriya Swayamsewak Sangh say, is losing its Hindu majority to Christian “missionaries”. 

A series of actions by government organisations and party hoodlums have put fear in the hearts of the community, its religious leadership and the managements of its many institutions.

Long years ago, the numerous Convents and educational and medical institutions in Bangalore had given it the name the “Catholic capital of India”. But Christians do not really matter politically in the state other than in the coastal belt of Mangalore which saw massive violence in 2007 and 2008 in the wake of the pogrom against Christians in Kandhamal in Orissa. At a mere 1.93 % of the population, the community can swing a handful of Assembly seats, and is not even considered a swing vote in most constituencies.

The Muslims matter at 12.92 % of the population though Hindus at 84 % are higher than the near 80 % in the national population. And off-record, the Muslims fear they are the real target of the government and the extreme elements of the Sangh Parivar who have earned notoriety in the assassination of intellectuals and writers.

Despite the heavy coverage in the media that the law would be enacted in the winter session of the Assembly, no one has seen even a draft of the legislation. On its wordings will depend the actual political intent of the government. If it lists “conversions by force or by fraud” as reasons for criminalising such an act, its target will essentially be the Christian community.

If it contains the additional clauses “marriage with intent to convert” the spouse, specially a woman, it will be clear that Bommai is serving the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah electoral policy of consolidating the Hindu vote by targeting Muslims before the next round of Assembly polls, and the general elections of 2024.

This is the clause in the law enacted by the Adityanath government and used to round up dozens of Muslim young men who had married Hindu women. Non-state actors then enjoy impunity, triggering poisonous hate campaigns, and vigilante violence.

It is an international axiom that ‘targeted hate begets violence’. Christian community remembers the violence that had been unleashed on religious places and institutions in Mangalore region in the wake of the anti-Christian pogrom in Kandhamal in August 2008.

The first Anti-Conversion Law was passed in Orissa in 1967. The attacks on the Christians began from 70s onwards, culminating in Kandhamal genocide in 2007 and 2008. The law gave a justification for the attacks on the Christians.

Justice A P Shah, who chaired the 2021 Kandhamal Day observances, noted: ‘Scores of people were killed, villages were ransacked, thousands of houses were looted and burnt. Overnight, over 75,000 people became homeless. Mainly one community bore the brunt of all this violence, as those who lost their homes, villages and belongings were predominantly Christian. Churches, schools, colleges, philanthropic institutions, even leprosy homes and TB sanatoriums were destroyed and looted. Schooling and education came to standstill, dozens of women were raped and molested. And many were forced to convert to Hinduism.’

As of October 2021, Karnataka ranks fourth in the country for its targeted violence against Christians. Of the 320 or so cases recorded by the United Christian forum, the Evangelical Fellowship of India and Persecution Relief, Uttar Pradesh topped with 99, Madhya Pradesh had 45, Chhattisgarh recorded 39 and Karnataka 23.  Orissa which had in 2008 witnessed the most vicious pogrom against the community ever had 15 cases. National capital Delhi recorded 4. Bengal had one incident.

International forums have taken note of the increase of persecution of Christians in India. In 2020, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) demoted India to ‘Countries of Particular Concern’ in their report. The US State Department ranked India’s persecution as severe along with Iraq and Afghanistan. During the past seven years, India has fallen from number 31 to 10 in persecution.

The report says: “The Christians are persecuted in all areas of public and private life, and anti-conversion laws (currently in nine states, with more considering adoption) are abused to harass and intimidate Christians. Few people are convicted under these laws, but cases can drag on for years.”

Muslims have a point, too. Several of the eight states which have laws called Freedom of Religion Acts, a misnomer whose cynicism is not lost on the global human rights community, have fine-tuned them from their earlier role against Catholic clergy and evangelical pastors, to Muslim young men courting and marrying Hindu women.

Uttar Pradesh, which did not have an anti-conversion law, quickly enacted one to stop interfaith marriages saying that women were enticed and then forced to change their religion. Police and religious groups quickly joined in targeting pastors and Muslim men as Chief Minister Adityanath looked approvingly.

Karnataka, most likely, will not approach the process of law making from scratch. Most likely, it will build on the format in other states which have successfully stood the test of the courts.  These texts carefully say that the Act is to prevent conversions by force or fraud.

They differ marginally on such matters as quantum of punishment and need for prior permission. What remains to be seen is how it steps up conditions for lawful conversion and penalties for violations of the law.

The Bill in the Gujarat Assembly this summer said organization heads and other persons found violating the law could be sentenced from three to 10 years, and a fine of up to Rs. 500,000. A marriage will be declared void, with the burden of proof to lie with the accused facing such a non-bailable charge. Topping it was the provision that a woman’s ‘siblings or any other person related by blood, marriage or adoption’ could lodge a complaint. This is the most severe penalty anywhere in India where this stringent law exists.

Orissa was the first state to enact such a law. The state High Court struck it down. The State moved the Supreme Court which upheld the law. The core point was that every individual had the right to adopt the religion or belief of his or her choice, but others did not have the right to coerce him or invite him by inducements to join their faith.

State High Courts since then have upheld the premise of the laws despite jurists, civil society and international rights groups arguing that they violate freedom of not just religious minorities but curtail the religious freedom of all citizens. The laws presume that Dalits, Adivasis, women and marginalised communities lack faculties to discern their own good and make educated choices, activists say.

There is no pretence at equality of religions in the eye of the law. Conversions to Christianity and Islam are questioned, but conversions to Hinduism are permitted, if not actively encouraged in the guise of ‘Ghar Wapsi’ or return to the ‘mother religion’.

High Courts in some recent judgements seem to have further encouraged this holding that Christians of Scheduled Caste origin will become eligible to the protection of the law and grant of reservations in jobs and education once they convert to Hinduism. Article 341 (3) reserves these privileges only to Scheduled Castes professing Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism and Buddhism. The minority communities have challenged this law in the Supreme Court.

The right wing of the majority community has kept up its pressure on the Bommai government. A delegation of Hindu seers and Sri Rama Sene’s president Pramod Muthalik met the Chief Minister and reiterated the demand for a law at the earliest. Sri Rama Sene and Bajrang Dal have been in the lead protesting against what they call ‘forced conversion’ by Christian pastors in several parts of the state.

The Bajrang Dal, a few days ago, disturbed a Christian prayer meeting at Belur alleging Hindus are being forcibly converted and the prayer hall constructed was illegal.  In Belagavi, the police told Christians to avoid prayer meetings if they don't want to be attacked by right wing activists. “A few pastors were called and told to not conduct prayers saying right wing groups may attack them and the police will not be able to give them protection,” Pastor Thomas Johnson said. Others were told not to hire halls or similar premises for their Sunday prayers if they did not have a church building.

The survey of Churches and prayer halls was stopped after a sharp letter to the Chief Minister and a press conference by Bengaluru Archbishop Peter Machado last month.

A delegation of Bishops and Christian leaders met the Belagavi Police Commissioner and submitted a memorandum, seeking protection. “This is a dangerous development wherein it appears that instead of giving protection to the Christians we are asked to stop all our activities because of the threats posed by certain sections of people in the society.... All that is happening in these prayer halls is within the framework of the Constitution. We would personally feel, instead of restraining the priests and pastors from praying, the miscreants should be booked, and action taken,” said the memorandum.