Church held responsible for condition of Dalit Christians

In a brazen act of direct criticism, a Christian group working among Dalits has held Church responsible for the still degrading condition of Dalit Christians in India.

Mr. R. L Francis, President of the 'Poor Christian Liberation Movement' (PCLM) says "church authorities are spending crores of rupees to spread their kingdom through preaching" instead of holistically being concerned of the appalling situation of the "untouchables".

Francis is of an opinion that "if the church spends more money for the development and enlistment rather than on preaching" then Dalits "will have better opportunity in their lives."

He substantiates his statement by pointing that church authorities have best educational institutions in the country and have a hold "on 22% educational institutions and 30% of health care."

"Next to government, the churches are the biggest land owners in India," Francis asserts, questioning why in spite of enough facilities with the church, the Dalit Christians' condition is deteriorating.

According to him, there are 15% Dalit Christians in the cities and 40% Dalit Christians in the rural areas who are illiterate in spite of the best convent schools by the church.

Further, in the offensive outburst penned in a statement, the PCLM claims, "church has crores of rupees and enough means to provide better education and job to Dalit Christians" but is being misused "by the authorities as they wish."

"In Madhya Pradesh the Catholic Church have more then one 150 High schools and half of them are convent schools. In Bhopal alone church have properties, movable and unmovable, worth of more than 600 crores yet Christians' condition is not improved."

The PCLM has apparently approached Mr. Anand Bernard, member of the Madhya Pradesh State Minority Commission, pressing the immediate formation of Waqf like board to place church properties under state control.

Such a proposal, earlier led to protests from the Catholic Church, which subsequently saw the rejection of the proposition by the state government.

Presently, there are over 250 million Dalits in India and at least 20 million of the 25 million Christians are from Dalit background.