A 400-year-old chapel in western India faces the threat of demolition as local politicians aim to acquire the land and use it for a football pitch, local Catholics have claimed.
They are protesting that the chapel of Our Lady Of Remedies in Daman, built during the Portuguese colonial era in 1607, is threatened by a controversial development planned by the pro-Hindu Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP).
Daman and Diu is a federally-ruled territory that comes directly under the administrative control of the BJP-led government in New Delhi.
Rui Pereira, a local Catholic leader, is part of a group which met recently with Daman Municipal Council to express concern.
“They want to acquire the chapel's land and once they acquire the land, they can do whatever they want, and they want to expand the football field which means they want to flatten the chapel.”
Fr Brian Rodrigues, who provides religious services at the chapel, said the group is preparing to take the case to the High Court in Mumbai.
Violence and discrimination against India’s Christians is on the rise throughout India amidst concern that the ruling BJP party is fuelling anti-Christian prejudice.
India’s top court has directed seven state governments to present details of the action taken by their law enforcement agencies in cases of alleged attacks against Christians and their institutions.
On 6 February the Supreme Court ordered the states of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttar Pradesh to present the information within three weeks. The court wants to assess the claims of Christian petitioners on alleged violent incidents against their communities.
The order came while hearing a public interest petition filed by Archbishop Peter Machado of Bangalore, along with the National Solidarity Forum and the Evangelical Fellowship of India.
In the petition, Archbishop Machado said on average 45 to 50 attacks on Christians took place every month in India during 2021.
Christians make up 2.3 percent of India’s 1.4 billion population.
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