Evangelical Christians in India’s eastern state of Andhra Pradesh faced the difficult task Sunday, May 10, of rebuilding their church after suspected anti-Christian militants torched the building, the latest in a series of attacks against churches in the area, investigators said.
The latest incident has underscored an anti-Christian climate in several parts of India.
With elections underway in India, its 2.3 percent Christian minority — which faced a deadly spate of attacks in the eastern state of Orissa last year — is praying for a secular party to come to power.
Along with the Muslim community, Christians fear that if the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies form the next government or an ideologically loose coalition comes to the helm, their already compromised welfare may further deteriorate.
A belief in witches and the evils purportedly wrought by them — from famine to sporting failure — is widespread among tribal communities in the country’s impoverished rural hinterland.
It is estimated that 750 people, mostly elderly women, have been killed in witch-hunts in the states of Assam and West Bengal since 2003.
Also: Some academics claim that witch-hunts are an economic phenomenon.
Related: 16-year-old girl was beaten to death by villagers.