GRAHAM Staines' long-time friend Subhankar Ghosh - a Botany teacher - in Cuttack was awakened by the first shouts. Peering through a mud hut window, barely 300 yards from the chapel door where Staines and his children slept in the station wagon, he saw a mob surrounding the vehicle. I heard shouts, beatings, screams, brickbatting, banging of doors. They were shouting maro, maro, maro and zindabad. Then suddenly the station wagon was in flames. Outside the hut, the mob prevented all rescue efforts. When the mob left an hour later, Staines and his children lay charred. Next day, the cops scooped out the heap. The target was Staines: his camera, watch and Bible remained. It was gruesome. I'll never forget, says Ghosh. Neither will the nation.
Soutik Biswas
WHAT'S common to L.K. Advani, T.N. Chaturvedi, Vinod Khanna and Madan Prasad Jaiswal? They are bjp MPs and all of them have either been to a missionary school or college. Of the nearly 180 bjp MPs, as many as half have studied in Christian-run institutions. Their children and grandchildren go to convent schools as well. So when the prime minister seeks a national debate on conversions, it may be relevant for him to cast an eye on his own flock. Even Rita Verma, MP from Dhanbad and convenor of the Swadeshi Jagaran Manch mela, who did her matriculation from Ursulain College in Ranchi and went on to do a PhD, gleefully remarks: I have always been a first class student. Which prompts the question: Are these centres of evangelisation, conversion and deculturisation good only for those living in cities and harmful for the poor?
Murali Krishnan
