Pictures of Hindu deities replaced with Jesus Christ's, Hindus offered incentives to convert
Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh, India 
20 October, 2024
Case Summary
In the Kandharapur area of Azamgarh district, an incident involving forced religious conversion caused tension among locals. Reports indicated that some individuals attempted to replace pictures of Hindu deities in villagers' homes with images of Jesus Christ, offering financial incentives to encourage conversion. Regular gatherings were held every Sunday and Thursday, where Christian literature, including Bibles, was distributed to attendees. Upon receiving complaints from the villagers, the police conducted an investigation and confiscated a significant amount of Christian literature from the site. A man named Rajaram, suspected to be the main organiser, was detained. The BJP District Vice President submitted a complaint demanding strict action, condemning the removal of Hindu deity images and accusing the organisers of enticing villagers with money to attend prayer meetings.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case is being added to the primary category 'Predatory Proselytisation' and two sub-categories, 'converting/attempting to convert by inducement' and 'attempting to convert/converting by denigrating Hinduism'. Predatory Proselytisation is not just limited to threat, harassment, force and violence, but it also has contours of stealth. In several cases, the Hindu victim is exploited to convert, with non-Hindus taking advantage of their poverty. In such cases, the Hindu victim who is suffering financially is offered monetary benefits, including lucrative offers for jobs, health treatment, education, etc, to induce the victim into changing his/her religion. In such cases, the religious identity of the victim and the aim to disenfranchise him from his faith form the heart of the crime. Also, taking advantage of and exploiting an individual’s economic vulnerabilities is widely acknowledged as exploitation, forms of which are often penalised by law. Such cases therefore are considered religiously motivated hate crimes since the victim’s religious identity forms the very heart of the crime itself. Further, in several cases, Hindus are converted or an attempt is made to convert Hindus by denigrating their faith, Hinduism. In such cases, the Hindus associate with the non-Hindu perpetrators often by choice and then, the attempt to convert them by insulting their faith, showing the faith down etc begins. An example of this would be a non-Hindu gathering where the Hindus are attending the gathering of their own free will. However, once they attend the gathering, there is an explicit attempt to convert them by abusing their faith and hailing the faith of the perpetrator. The denigration of the Hindu faith is often based on misrepresentation of the Hindu faith, its doctrine and scriptures and insult to espoused traditions if not blatant lies about Hindu beliefs and ways. Such conversions or attempts at conversions are driven by animosity towards the Hindu faith and are therefore documented as religiously motivated hate crimes. In this case, there are elements of both sub-categories. The perpetrators attempted to incentivise local Hindus to convert to Christianity by offering them money. Conversion by inducement and manipulating the vulnerabilities of the pool is outlawed because it employs deceitful methods to force vulnerable individuals to abandon their religious identity. Further, the case has also been added to an attempt to convert by denigrating Hinduism because the Christian perpetrators, owing to their religious animosity towards Hinduism, were inducing the Hindu villagers to replace the images of Hindu Gods and Goddesses with that of Jesus Christ. Replacing the images of Hindu Gods stems out of their inherent prejudice and animosity towards Hindus and it is an act of defiling and denigrating the faith of the Hindus. For the above reasons, this case is being added to the hate crime database.
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Christian Extremists
Perpetrators Range
One Person
Perpetrators Gender
male
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