Christians face social boycott in village-GCIC approached NHRC for intervention
Demands civil society to stand up the threat.The social boycott is subsequent to the BJP MLA's exhortation to weed out Christians in India
Karwar: A dispute over the observation of a ‘vrata' (vow) to appease the village deity at Magalawada village in Haliyal taluk resulted in the social boycott of the Christians by Hindus in the tiny village. With both the communities sticking to their stand, the situation in the village is tense.

It all started five days ago when the priest of St. Sebastian Church allegedly asked the Catholics not to follow the Hindu practices, according to Hindus in the village.

They said that after the spread of cholera in the village last month, the people of the village decided to pray to the village deity by not working for two Tuesdays and three Fridays during Shravana month in the Hindu almanac.

Defied

According to Hindus, during this period agriculture activity or business was not taken up. But Father Philip Rock of St. Sebastian Church intervened and asked the Christia not to follow Hindu tradition.

He allegedly made some derogatory remarks against the Hindu customs at a Sunday assembly in the church.

After this, the Christiansdefied the decision of the village elders and returned to their work during the worship days.

Upset with this, Hindus held a meeting and issued the directive that Hindus should not use vehicles owned by Christians places and that Hindu vehicle owners should not allow Christians to travel by their vehicles. All business and grocery shops of hristians were boycotted. Even Hindu boys stopped distributing newspapers to Christian houses. Agricultural equipment belonging to Christians were not repaired by Hindus.

Hindus were warned against engaging the Christians workers.

Even the pygmy agents were banned from collecting money from Christian houses. Students were banned from attending the Catholic-run schools and only four out of 42 Hindu students in a school attended class on Saturday, said Manawal Soz and John Bastanv of the village.

Fr. Rock, who faces charges of causing disharmony, refuted the allegation and said that Christians did not impose their religion on anybody. The boycott was against the fundamental right of the Christians,

Aziz Desai, tahsildar and Umesh Shet police inspector visited the village on Friday and held the meeting.