Policemen stand guard outside St James Church in the Mariyanpalya area in Bangalore on Sunday. — PTI |
Bangalore, September 21
Cocking a snook at the Karnataka government’s claim of providing protection to Christian places of worship, one or more miscreants last night broke into a church at Mariyanpalya on the outskirts of Bangalore city and ransacked it.
Three more incidents, including two in Bangalore, targeting churches were also reported since last night. The incident at the St James Church at Mariyanpalya was the worst of the four.
Miscreants broke open the back door of the church and opened the communion box, removed the “prasadam” kept inside the box in brass pots and scattered the sacred offering all over the floor near the altar.
The miscreants also opened the cabinets in the room attached to the main prayer hall and ransacked the ceremonial clothes, candleholders, lamp-stands and other things that were kept in that room. The Sunday mass could not take place in the church today as the worshippers found to their horror that it had been broken open at night and vandalised.
“It cannot be a case of theft. Nothing has been taken away from the church. Things have taken out and strewn and scattered all over”, Rani, a member of the church, said.
The wooden door at the backside of the church, which had been broken open, had a built-in lock as well as an external heavy lock. Whoever broke the lock did in quite expertly as the priest, whose house is in the church compound, did not hear anything that could have been a cause of alarm.
The incident came to light in the morning when a woman, who lives in priest Joseph Menzes’s house, came to church at six in the morning to put off the electric light that was kept on during the night. Police had been now deployed in the premises of the church.
The church is located on an unmetalled road on the left hand side of the road leading to the city’s new airport. No security was there in the church last night despite the spate of attack on the churches witnessed in the state since last Sunday.
Rani, Vasanth Kumar and others, who had gathered in the church, said the local Bajrang Dal activists took out a procession in the area last Sunday morning when the mass was going on in the church. “The activists shouted slogans while passing through the road in front of the church”, members of the church said. Simon C. N. Salomon and Lawrence, who are also members of the
church, issued a statement accusing the Bajrang Dal and its local leader for the “attack” on the church. Former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda and Congress leader of the Opposition in the state assembly, Mallikarjun Kharge visited the church and assured the members of support. High police officials also went to the church in the wake of the incident.
In another incident at Rajarajeswari Nagar on the outskirts of the city, unidentified miscreants threw stones at the glass cover of a statue of infant Jesus installed outside a church and fled. Similar incidents took place at Banaswadi area in the city and at Nelliyahudikere village in Kodagu.
Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa, who chaired a high-level meeting to review the situation soon after fresh attacks were reported, charged that the attacks were an organised conspiracy by those who did not wish peace to return to the state.
