NEW DELHI — A series of episodes at churches over the last two months has prompted Roman Catholics here to worry about a deliberate campaign of violence, and to call on Prime Minister Narendra Modi to speak out against religious intimidation.
At least five Catholic churches in and around Delhi have reported various attacks, including suspected arson, burglary, vandalism and stone-throwing. The latest was discovered on Monday morning at St. Alphonsa’s Church in New Delhi, where a parish employee found the church’s front door broken open, ceremonial vessels missing, and communion wafers strewn about.
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N. S. Minhas, a neighborhood police officer, said that because the fire was a “sensitive issue and a religious matter,” the case had been handed over to an investigative branch of the Delhi police. Saying he saw no apparent motive for arson, Mr. Minhas raised the possibility that the fire had been an accident involving fuel from the church’s generator.
Anil Couto, the archbishop of Delhi, said he was not satisfied with the police explanation of an incident at a church in West Delhi in January, when a glass display case containing a statue of the Virgin Mary was smashed. The police said in a news conference that three drunken men had broken it as an “act of bravado” for which they were “remorseful.”
