500 Christians killed in Kandhamal claims report

According to reports of CPI (Marxist Leninist) fact-finding team, at least 500 Christians were killed in the month-long anti-Christian violence in Orissa's Kandhamal district.

The report said: "The official figure for deaths has been reported to be 31; however, a senior government official on the condition of anonymity informed (the team) that he himself consigned two hundred dead bodies - found from the jungle - to flames after getting them collected in a tractor. As per his estimates based on the intensity and pace of killings the number of those killed is over five hundred."

Published in the November issue of the Liberation, CPI (ML)'s official journal, the report signed by J.P Mizg said, the team visited affected villages and relief camps where the condition of the victims are very appalling.

"Our team visited Phulbani, Tikabali, Ji Udaygiri and Rakiya relief camps and found that the inmates of the camp are living in extremely bad conditions. In the name of breakfast they get only fifty grams of chura (beaten rice) and rice-dal for meals, which is not enough to satisfy the needs of hunger and nutrition."

The CPI-M members also noted that there has been no arrangement for pregnant women or medicines freely available to the sick. The camp inmates sleep on plastic mats on the ground.

The victims narrating their experiences told the fact-finding team that the VHP and Bajrang Dal cadres organised meetings targeting Christians and indulged in violent riotings.

Riot-victims are frightened to go back to their villages because they have been threatened that if they return they will be hacked into pieces, its report said. "The rioters are also proclaiming that only Hindu converts will be allowed to return."

The report further said: "In the communal fire two hundred Christian villages and 127 Church and prayer halls were either destroyed or burnt. Apart from this, schools, hospitals, hostels and convents also have been damaged. The incidents of killings, rape and loot also were carried out in addition to former incidents. The shocking fact is that all these incidents took place in full view of police and the police remained mute spectators."

The CPI-M has demanded a ban on VHP and Bajrang Dal and the Chief Minister to tender his resignation for his failure to control the violence since August 23 following the murder of a Hindu leader.