Judge says authorities backed radicals in Karnataka

(February 25, 2011) A former high court judge, who probed the 2008 anti-Christian attacks on churches in southern India’s Karnataka state, says Hindu radical groups planned them and the state’s pro-Hindu government sponsored them. “Over 1,500 attacks on various churches in Karnataka were pre-planned and supported by the ruling party in the state,” Michael Saldanha, a Catholic, said on Feb. 22 in Mumbai after releasing the Peoples Tribunal Enquiry report. The retired judge of the Karnataka high court gave a copy to Mumbai Archbishop, Cardinal Oswald Gracias, the president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India, CBCI. Saldanha dismissed as a “whitewash” the report of the B. K. Somashekhara commission that probed the attacks for the government but totally exonerated Hindu groups and the government. Saldanha said his investigation has revealed that the government had supported and covered a “hate campaign” against the Christians in the state and accused Karnataka Chief Minister B. S. Yeddyyurappa and Home Minister B. V. Acharya for the attacks. He demanded legal action against all responsible for the attacks, including police and government officers. Various Christian denominations have demanded the rejection of the Somashekhara report and that the Central Bureau of Investigation take up the probe.