A village court in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand has ordered families who converted to Christianity to be caned, fined and excommunicated from the community.
Three Korwa tribal families from Khala village of Dhurki in Garhwa district embraced Christianity on Jan. 22, according to media reports.
“There are reports of religious conversion in the area but they are of different denominations as a few small sects are active there. It is a matter of investigation and it should be thoroughly checked as it may give wrong messages among different faiths,” Father Augustin Xess, parish priest of St Paul’s Church in Garhwa, told.
“As far as the Catholic Church is concerned, we don’t promote religious conversion.”
The tribal priest said Hindus, followers of the Sarna tribal religion and a small number of Muslims and Christians have been living in the area peacefully with great respect for all faiths.
“After the news of religious conversion came out, we have alerted our people in the area and asked them to give us an actual report,” he added.
Father Fabianus Sinduria, who coordinates pastoral work in Daltonganj Diocese, told that “we came to know of the incident only through the local Hindi newspaper and are waiting for the final say by the local administration.”

A key accused in the Bhima Koregaon case has moved the Bombay High Court after a US firm revealed that a hacker had planted incriminating evidence on his computer. A report by Arsenal Consulting, a digital forensic analyst from Chelsea, US, has debunked the electronic evidence gathered by India’s National Investigation Agency to arrest Rona Wilson and 15 others in the Bhima Koregaon violence case. Among the arrested is 83-year-old Jesuit Father Stan Swamy, who has been working among tribal communities in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand.
They were arrest for their alleged ties with Maoist and for inciting riots during a celebratory gathering organized to mark the 200 years of the Koregaon-Bhima battle. On January 1, 2018, the violence at Bhima Koregaon village in Pune district left one dead and injured several others, inclu-ding 10 policemen. Violence erupted after some people, reportedly with saffron flags, pelted stones at cars heading towards the village for the commemoration of the 200 years of Bhima-Koregaon war on New Year’s Day.
The US digital forensics firm, which analyzed an electronic copy of the Wilson’s laptop, concluded that an attacker used malware to infiltrate the laptop and planted documents on it.
According to a report by the Washington Post, Arsenal Consulting found that the letter — along with at least nine others — had been planted in a hidden folder on Wilson’s computer by an unidentified attacker who used NetWire, a malware, to control and spy on the laptop.
According to Arsenal Consulting’s findings, Wilson received emails that appeared to be from a fellow activist, urging him to click on a link to download an innocuous statement from a civil liberties group. But this link actually deployed NetWire, a malicious software that allowed a hacker to access Wilson’s computer.

Pope Francis and Indian bishops have expressed grief over a massive glacier burst that killed at least 32 people in northern India.
The tragedy in Uttarakhand’s Chamoli district on Feb. 7 also left more than 170 missing as the rescue operation carried on until late on Feb. 10, media reports said.
“I express my closeness to the victims of the calamity that happened in India where part of a glacier separated itself, provoking violent flooding that devastated two power plants,” Pope Francis said in a tweet on Feb. 10.
“I pray for the workers who died, for their families and for all those who were wounded.”
Cardinal Oswald Gracias of Bombay, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India (CBCI), said on Feb. 9 that the CBCI expresses its grief and offers its condolences to the family members of all those who have died or are missing as a result of the Uttarakhand glacier calamity.

Nine Christians charged under a newly enacted anti-conversion law in central India’s Madhya Pradesh state plan to seek bail from the state’s High Court after a trial court denied them bail.
The court in Indore city turned down the bail application on Jan. 27, a day after the Protestant Christians were arrested from a Catholic media centre where they had gathered for a routine prayer service.
Judge Yatindra Kumar Guru denied them bail, saying that “it does not seem appropriate to grant bail to the accused, looking into the facts and circumstances.”
Pastor Patras Savil, who is providing legal help to the detained Christians, said they are now “left with no other option than moving the High Court” for bail.
Police charged 11 Christians with violating Madhya Pradesh’s stringent anti-conversion law after right-wing Hindu activists stormed into a prayer service at Satprakashan Sanchar Kendra, a Catholic media center. They accused the Christians of conducting mass religious conversion.
The media center run by the Society of the Divine Word offer-ed the Protestant group space to conduct prayer services.
The center contacted police when the Hindu activists barged into the center. But the activists demanded police take action against the Christians for violating a new anti-conversion law enacted on Jan. 9.

Turning beads into elegant rosaries isn’t merely Vilma Antony’s sustenance. It’s her spiritual calling. She counts the prayers of thanksgiving, devotion, and confession as she strings her silver beads, interspersing this activity with gospel readings at her village home a few miles from the South Indian port city of Kochi. She’s joined by 10 other women who sing and narrate folk stories as they string the sacred prayer beads through the afternoon. Antony’s home is among 2,000 others in Koonammavu — a northern suburb of Kochi city— that has nurtured rosary making for over two centuries. The villagers call it their “little Rome” from which they ship rosaries to different parts of India and beyond, including the United States, Europe, Africa, and Middle East.