Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath (left) and Chief Justice of India Justice Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud during the inauguration of a law university in Uttar Pradesh on Feb. 16. The monk-turned-politician enacted the draconian anti-conversion law in 2020. (Photo AFP)
Some 30 Christians, including a Catholic priest, face an inordinate delay in securing bail and continue in various jails of northern Uttar Pradesh state after being arrested on charges of illegal conversion activities this year.
Bishop Gerald John Mathias of Lucknow, based in the state capital, sought prayers for their release including his priest Dominic Pinto, on March 1 after the priests' bail application was postponed for the third consecutive time.
The delay in hearing the bail application is “sad and unfortunate and discouraging,” the bishop said.
Pinto is among 39 Christians arrested and remanded in the first two months of this year in the northern Indian state following complaints of violating the state’s stringent anti-conversion law.
Christian leaders in the state said some seven of the 39 arrested secured bail but others continue in jail.
“Let us not lose hope,” Mathias said and asked Christians to “continue to pray until bail is granted.”
Pinto was arrested and sent to jail on Feb. 5.
The priest is among 15 persons, including five women, accused of organizing mass religious conversion in an area under Deva police station in Barabanki district.
They were accused of violating the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021.
The law criminalizes forced religious conversions. It also demands all religious conversion ceremonies be conducted with approval from the designated government officials. Violators can punished with 10 years imprisonment and a fine.
A Christian leader, who is assisting those in jail, told UCA News that bail applications of more than 30 Christians “are pending in different courts.”
The Church leader said they face delay in getting bail applications listed for hearing. “We also face sudden postponement of the hearing for no reason,” the Church leader lamented.
The bail application of Pinto and 10 others was scheduled for hearing on March 1, but it was postponed to March 7 as the designated judge was on leave.
“This is the third time hearing on the bail application of Father Pinto and others is postponed,” said Father Donald D’Souza, chancellor and spokesperson of Lucknow diocese.
“Twice the court canceled the hearing after two lawyers practicing in the court died,” Father D’Souza told UCA News on March 1.
Father Pinto, the diocesan pastoral center director, was arrested after a Protestant Christian group conducted a routine prayer service in his pastoral center. The prayer service was projected as a mass conversion activity.
Father D’Souza wanted the government and the judiciary to “take a serious note on the inordinate delay” in taking up bail applications “as it infringes upon a citizen’s right to free movement.”
Christian leaders say persecution against Christians has increased in Uttar Pradesh after 2017, when Yogi Adiynath, a Hind monk-turned-politician became the state chief minister after his pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won state elections.
“Even a prayer meeting has become a crime in Uttar Pradesh,” said Pastor Dinesh Kumar Maurya, who faced several cases under the anti-conversion law in the state.
“A couple of days back, I was taken to a police station after I arranged a birthday function in my home,” Pastor Maurya told UCA News.
United Christian Forum, a New Delhi-based ecumenical group that records persecution against Christians, said from January to November 2023, the state accounted for 287 of the 687 anti-Christian incidents in India.
Christians make up about 0.18 percent of the Hindu-majority state’s more than 200 million people.
