2008
The 2008 Kandhamal violence was particularly devastating, with reports indicating
During the 2008 Kandhamal violence, violence occurred from 25 August 2008 to 28 August 2008 between groups led by Sangh Parivar organizations and Christians in the Kandhamal district of Orissa. It started after the murder of Vishva Hindu Parishad leader Lakshmanananda Saraswati.
- Casualties: At least 90 Christians killed, according to government reports, though unofficial sources suggest the number could be higher.
- Destruction: Over 395 churches and between 5,600–6,500 houses were plundered or burnt down, affecting more than 600 villages and displacing approximately 60,000–75,000 people.
- 13 educational institutes were set on fire, demolished or vandalized during the attacks .
- 18,000 people injured.
- Another report said that around 11,000 people were still living in relief camps, as of October 2008.
- Some tribals even fled away to border districts in neighboring states and 310 villages were affected.
A Christian girl who was bruised and burnt during the anti Christian violence in Orissa in August.
1999
Graham Staines
Graham Staines was an Australian Christian missionary was engaged in the education of poor and illiterate indigenous tribes in Odisha. He also worked among the leprosy patients in the region. On the night of 22 January 1999, he was sleeping in his station wagon when it was set afire. Graham and his two sons, ten-year-old Philip and six-year-old Timothy, were burned alive.
Death and reaction
On 22 January 1999, Staines attended a jungle camp in Manoharpur, which was an annual gathering for Christians in the area to congregate for a conference and discuss their beliefs in a social setting. The camp was on the border between the tribal villages of Mayurbhanj and Keonjhar, which is located within the district of Odisha. He was travelling to the village of Kendujhar with his sons, who were on a break from their schooling in the hill city of Ooty in southern India, when they decided to take a break from the journey towards the jungle camp, and elected to spend the night in Manoharpur, sleeping in the vehicle due to the severe cold at the time. His wife and daughter did not accompany them on the journey, having decided to remain behind in the town and municipality of Baripada.
A mob of about fifty people, armed with axes and other implements, attacked the vehicle while Staines and his sons were fast asleep, and set the station wagon alight, trapping them inside and burning them to death. Current BJP MP Pratap Chandra Sarangi was also believed to be a part of this murder as he was Odisha State Unit Chief of the Bajrang Dal during this planned murder.
Staines and his sons had awakened and apparently tried to escape but were prevented from doing so by the angry mob of vigilantes.
The murders were widely condemned by religious and civic leaders of the time, along with politicians and journalists. The US-based Human Rights Watch group accused the Indian government of failing to prevent violence against Christians, and for exploiting the sectarian tensions that existed at the time for their own political gain. Then-prime minister of India, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, a leader of the BJP, condemned the "ghastly attack," and called for swift action in catching the killers. Published reports stated that the church leaders alleged the attacks were carried out at the behest of hard-line Hindu organizations seeking revenge for what they perceived to be forced conversions of the tribal poor into Christianity.
Dara Singh, who was convicted of the murders, was treated as a hero by the hard-line Hindus and reportedly protected by some villagers. In an interview with the Hindustan Times, one of the accused killers, Mahendra Hembram, stated that the killers "were provoked by the 'corruption of tribal culture' by the missionaries, who they claimed fed villagers beef, and gave the women brassieres and sanitary towels."
In her affidavit before the commission on the death of her husband and both sons, Gladys Staines stated:
The Lord God is always with me to guide me and to help me try to accomplish the work of Graham, but I sometimes wonder why Graham was killed, and what also made his assassins behave in such a brutal manner on the night of the 22nd/23rd of January 1999. It is far from my mind to punish the persons who were responsible for the death of my husband Graham and my two children. But it is my desire and hope that they would repent and be reformed.
