U.S. pastor attacked by Hindu activists

Society Religion & Philosophy
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I was under the impression that south India was less violence prone due to higher education levels. This threw a wrench in those impressions. Reading this news story showed that similar stuff had happened to other missionaries in the past.

Does RSS have a lot of support among the population or gets no hassle from laww enforcement due to its ties to the ruling BJP government?

COCHIN, India (Reuters) - A visiting U.S. pastor, attacked by suspected Hindu activists in southern India last week, has been told to leave the country for preaching while on a tourist visa, police said Tuesday.

Protestant missionary Joseph Cooper, 67, and an Indian colleague were attacked with swords and iron bars by a suspected gang of Hindu hard-liners as they walked home from a gospel convention in Kerala state last Monday.

“He has come here on a tourist visa and was found to be preaching at conventions, which is against the rules of the visa,” said P.Vijaya Anand, deputy inspector general of police.

“We have served a notice Monday asking him to leave India within seven days,” Anand told Reuters.

Cooper, who was injured on the hand and treated at a hospital in the state capital, was not immediately available for comment.

Police arrested nine Hindu activists in connection with the attack and said they were members of the radical Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the ideological parent of India’s ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.

The RSS, however, denied any involvement in the incident.

Local Hindu leaders accused Cooper and his Indian colleague of trying to influence Hindus to convert to Christianity.

But Cooper said after the attack he had not spoken about other religions at the gospel convention and denied any attempt at conversion.

Christian missionaries have been attacked by Hindu activists across the country in the past and two pastors were seriously injured in Kerala in 1999 after an attack by RSS activists.

The same year, a mob of Hindu fanatics burned alive Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons as they slept in their jeep in a remote village in Orissa.

More than 80 percent of India’s one billion people are Hindus and less than three percent are Christians

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Fraudiya: Yes Fraudiya...All 350 million people in South India are racists. Almost a million episodes take place each year to support you new changely changed impression. The whole one billion people of the damn country are racists and violent against missionaries. Hope my last statement changes your impression there as well.

BTW/ SOmeone already posted this news like 3 days ago.

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yeah mod can merge tis thread with that thread. dinn know it existed

the point is that I have always been told that communal tensions are much less in south compared to north partially due to better education etc.

Now if you are going to start grumbling like Ooh that means all of them are bad, humanity is bad, the whole carbon based life form is bad...boo hooo, its not going to really answer the question is it?

point is, is south still less voilent than north, and do you as an Indian feel that RSS gets away with stuff de to its ties with the BJP government. simple answer without drama will be nice.

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Man BJP was voted into power as the representative voice of India. I think that says it all.

I hope for the reputation of India that they lose the next election but I'm not so confident any more.

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with such well wishers who needs enemies!

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[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Fraudz: *
yeah mod can merge tis thread with that thread. dinn know it existed

the point is that I have always been told that communal tensions are much less in south compared to north partially due to better education etc.
[/QUOTE]

last year there were over a dozen attacks on clergy in Georgia, Lousiana and Mississipi. so Mr.Fraudia, do you think Hindus have taken over the south of the US also?

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hindus r the most peace loving ppl…
all those incidents of mass murder of muslims and christians in india r merely rumors…

right jagjeevan??? :rolleyes:

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[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Jagjeevan: *

last year there were over a dozen attacks on clergy in Georgia, Lousiana and Mississipi. so Mr.Fraudia, do you think Hindus have taken over the south of the US also?
[/QUOTE]

looking at the motels, probably.

anyways whya re you taking this so personally, how many of your posts have I answered when we are discussing issues with muslim extremists in diff places. the least you could do is having the courtesy to have a real response to a real question. believe me this is not a post saying all hindus are bad. I dont play that game. I am just asking a few questions to increase my understanding since i am not familiar with the political climate in the southern India.

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The real answer to your question is, NO. As soon as the rest of the world identifies India as a hotbed of relgious fundamentalism, I am sure we can relate. Until then, these are isolated incidents that are shameful and idiotic but in no way they represent India. North, south, east or west.

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Pls listen what Praveen Togaria talks, the style and language.....looks like some Mian Togria, also openly threatening the kafirs, for him also kafir means a person not from his religion.......when all Hindus will follow these type of people India will be lost in the q of Islamic States.
A real degradation.

People like Togaria are given full coverage by media and the State, we have no right for excuses for killings of minoroties in India.

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If I have to characterize an entire religion as more peace loving than others, I’ll have to say the Parsis are the most peace loving I have come across. I knew a lot of them in Mumbai and all of them are first class gentlemen & ladies. Even though many of them seemed quite westernized, they retain enough commonality for me to conclude there is something peaceful and happy about them.

Next to that I’d say Hindus are the most peace loving.

Bhuddhism as a religion has more peace and harmony into its philosophic and contextual material I think but I know fewer practitioners in that vein.

The important point I’d like you to understand is this: the religious text may say a lot of peaceful things but to me, religion is what is in practice today. From that perspective, the Parsis, the Hindus, the Bhuddhists are in the top of the peace ladder.

If you’re referring to Godhra, I have not made up my mind about cause-effect yet. what mass murder of christians by Hindus are you referring to?

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[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Fraudz: *

looking at the motels, probably.

anyways whya re you taking this so personally, how many of your posts have I answered when we are discussing issues with muslim extremists in diff places. the least you could do is having the courtesy to have a real response to a real question. believe me this is not a post saying all hindus are bad. I dont play that game. I am just asking a few questions to increase my understanding since i am not familiar with the political climate in the southern India.
[/QUOTE]

I read and read my response after you posted this and I can't figure why you think I am taking this personally! but all the same I'll try better in future not give that impression.

if anything I made one assumption (which is probably what you refer to as the 'game' I assume you played) - that you knew about South India and were trying an innocent "here is an egg - do you think it could've been from a chicken?" game. If you're not then I was wrong.

South India is probably less into religious differences than the North but I don't want that to be mis-interpreted as N.India is full of religious fanatics of any kind. The partition obviously affected the Nort more than the South. Godhra train station is not in S.India. Neither is Bengal. These are the 3 places where religious rioting blot India in the past.

There is some anger seeping in though but it is a tiny trickle now. I know one dude in Chennai that approached me in a fancy restaurent and introduced himself as the local VHP prez. I didn't even know what VHP was then (1993 may be?). He knew the friend I was dining with - they're in the same profession I think.

Move away from the big cities, you will find even less awareness of violent anything religious. I've been to dozens of villages in T.N dominated by Muslims, living in close quarters to very chaste Hindus and have no problems. S.Indian Muslims dominate several businesses. Almost all pan leaf farms for which S.India is so famous for, are owned by them. Beedi factories, lungi factories, many metal shops & garages, perfumeries etc are Muslim dominated. In fact one of the most often heard complaints from old villagers is that all youngsters are leaving the villages to towns and cities and the Muslims are buying up all the houses and lands with 'gulf money'. Atleast this used to be the scene 10 years ago.

I still have ALL my friends from high school onwards (approx 20% muslim) and atleast one of those guys is still walking right up to our kitchen in S India and eating delicious brahmin food that the old cook makes - even though I haven't been there in years

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jagjeevan

thansk for your response, thsi is what I was lookign for, a better insight into south india. I dont play games to provocate people and post news stories just to flame others. TThere are those without lives who do this day in day out, but thats not my style.

he reason for me to ask some of these questions is to learn. I have never been to India and have spent very little time in Pakistan so my first hand knowledge of the stuff is limited.

anyways that gives me a better perspective in which to put this news story in. Thanks

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[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Chaltahai: *
The real answer to your question is, NO. As soon as the rest of the world identifies India as a hotbed of relgious fundamentalism, I am sure we can relate. Until then, these are isolated incidents that are shameful and idiotic but in no way they represent India. North, south, east or west.
[/QUOTE]

India is depicted over here as a nation led by a hardline fundamentalist government, and future Indian Prime Minister Advani is seen as one of the leading lights of the Hindutva movement. Just today Fernandes has claimed that Pakistan will be erased from the map if it contemplates using nuclear weapons. These are dumb statements coming from a leading politician and reflect badly on the whole nation and the electorate IMO.