'Sangh Parivar carried out 486 anti-Christian attacks in India in 2021,' says Kerala CM

With the BJP claiming that the clampdown on hate speech-accused PC George was a targeted onslaught on Christians by the LDF government, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan unleashed a tirade on the right-wing by listing a timeline of attacks on the minority community in the country allegedly carried out by the Sangh Parivar and other right-wing groups.

“How can anyone forget Graham Staines and his two sons who were burnt to death by the Bajrang Dal,” Pinarayi Vijayan said on Thursday at the start of his speech at an LDF convention connected to the upcoming Thrikkakara bypoll.

“In the guise of protecting Christians, they are backing a tongue that spews communal venom,” said Vijayan in a reference to Janapaksham leader PC George, who on Thursday was remanded to judicial custody for a recent hate speech held in Thiruvananthapuram.

Vijayan who claimed that the RSS/ Sangh Parivar has carried out 486 anti-Christian attacks in 2021 alone went had come up with a detailed timeline of events starting with the attack on churches in Gujarat in 1998.

“The BJP government that came to power (in Gujarat) continued the same policy and the attacks on churches and schools continued, led by the Bajrang Dal.

“In 2008, there was widespread violence in Odisha. Those who claim to be protectors of Christians took 38 Christian lives back then. To date, they haven't shown an iota of remorse. More than 40 women were raped, hundreds of churches destroyed and over 60,000 displaced. It was the CPM that opened its office to those who didn't have a roof to pray,” Vijayan added.

The Kerala CM mentioned the attacks on churches before and after the 2014 Lok Sabha polls and the 'terrifying crimes' against Christians in New Delhi in 2015. “In March 2021, four nuns travelling from Delhi to Odisha were attacked by the Sangh Parivar inside a train and at the Jhansi station. One of those nuns was a Malayali,” Vijayan said.

The veteran CPM leader who revisited the attacks on Christians in Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Karnataka and Telangana last year added that the “crimes against Muslims were much more”.

'Don't try that in Kerala'
Vijayan who warned 'stern action' on any attempts to harm minority communities in Kerala, said the PC George episode was a “test dose”.

“They tried a test dose with a man spewing communal hatred and have got a reaction. If they thought such blabbermouths are the face of Christians, they are mistaken.

“In this soil, everyone should be able to live with dignity, not being controlled and degraded like the Sangh Parivar is doing by attempting to deny citizens their citizenships through the Citizenship Amendment Act.”