Christian leaders in the central Indian Madhya Pradesh have objected to the state government’s move to put Church-run schools under the microscope.
State home minister Narottam Mishra announced on May 16 that police will monitor Church-run schools to curb religious conversions.
A day earlier, police arrest-ed six people, including two pastors, after Bajrang Dal, a militant Hindu organization, complained of suspected illegal conversions at the Christ Memorial School in the state capital Bhopal.
The six were booked for hurting religious sentiments under the Indian Penal Code and released the same day.
School director Manis Mathew told on May 17 that a Sunday prayer service in the school hall “was wrongly portrayed as a religious conversion activity to target our institution.”
Church leaders across denominations view the police action and the decision to monitor all Christian schools as a deliberate attempt to target and defame Christians through a false narrative.