Several thousand Christian educational institutions will shut down to protest violence against the community in the eastern state of Orissa where several churches have been burnt and 11 people were killed in revenge for the murder of a Hindu leader, it was announced Thursday, reported dpa.
The Indian church network - including the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India, the Evangelical Fellowship of India and the National Council of Churches in India - have appealed for the shut-down on Friday.
"Of the estimated 30,000 Christian educational institutions including schools and colleges in India, a majority have responded to the appeal for the shut-down," said Madhu Chandra, regional secretary of the All India Christian Council (AICC).
The AICC is a nation-wide alliance of Christian denominations, mission agencies, institutions, federations and Christian leaders.
"Communal organisations have taken the law into their hands in Orissa. What is at stake is not only the freedom of conscience of a minority community but India's secular democracy," the church network said in its letter to Christian organizations.
"The destructive and divisive communal forces have to be stopped. We want this message to go across to people, that is why we are closing our educational institutions in deep sorrow and anguish. We hope parents become aware of the implications of the incidents in Orissa," it added.
The NDTV network reported that at least 10,000 Christian institutions across India would close down in the first major strike action by Christian groups in the last 20 years.
"The last such shut-down was when Christian organizations protested for quotas in government jobs for dalit Christians (low-caste Hindus who converted to Christianity)," Chandra said.
Violence flared in Orissa after Laxmananda Saraswati, a Hindu leader from the right-wing Vishwa Hindu Parishad, was shot dead by suspected Maoist rebels in the central Kandhamal district on Saturday.
Hindu activists attacked Christians and torched churches alleging that Christians killed Saraswati as he was opposing religious conversion in the state. Christian organizations have denied the allegations.
In all, 11 people have been killed in the state since Saturday, 10 in Kandhamal and a woman in the Bargarh district who was burnt when the crowds attacked an orphanage.
Despite shoot-at-sight orders, mobs were gathering at different places and burning churches and homes, news reports said. More than 120 people have been arrested in the Kandhamal district for arson and rioting, the NDTV network reported quoting police officials.
Communally sensitive Kandhamal - with a population of around 600,000, including 150,000 Christians - has witnessed numerous clashes between Hindus and Christians in the past.
In one of the worst attacks on Christians in Orissa, Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons were burned alive by a fanatical Hindu mob that set their car on fire in Keonjhar district in 1999.