Orissa Christians panic over Christmas strike call

(December 20, 2011) Christians in eastern India’s Orissa state have asked authorities for protection after a tribal group called for a general strike during Christmas season in Kandhamal district. The Kui Samaj Seva Samity (Kui social service society) on Sunday called for the shut down from December 24 to 27 to protest what it said was government neglecting the district while allocating welfare funds. The strike call “has caused panic among Christians who are planning to celebrate Christmas after four years,” Bipra Charan Nayak, convener of the Survivors’ Associations of Communal Violence, told UCANEWS ON Monday. He recalled that the same tribal outfit had called for a similar strike in December 2007 that led to killing of five Christians in the Christmas week. Hundreds of houses were also torched. The district saw anti-Christian violence again in August 2008 that killed more than 90 people and rendered some 50,000 people homeless. Nayak appealed to authorities to take note of the latest strike call and act swiftly and sternly. He said Christians in Kandhamal have not celebrated Christmas openly after the 2007 violence. Fr. Santosh Digal, public relations officer of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar archdiocese that covers Kandhamal, sees “evil and malicious designs” in the strike call and urged the government to dissuade the tribal outfit from carrying out their plan. The priest alleged that the tribal group has the backing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a pro-Hindu nationalist organization.