7 persons, all staff of an NGO called Discipleship Center of Tihidi Block, Bhadrak dist. were arrested on the false charges of Conversion by allurement on at 1.30 pm on 4th November '08. The NGO has been doing social welfare work for a long time in the area. that day, they were engaged in relief work in the flood affected areas as assigned by their office. They were arranging relief materials to be delivered to the flood affected victims at a village called Daulatpur under Sindola panchayat, Tihidi Block of Bhadrak Dist, in Tihidi Block.
The previous day, on their way back from the field, they met with an accident in which two bicyclists were involved. At once a mob of around 500 to 1000 Hindutva fundamentalists gathered and detained them, subjected them to verbal abuse, false accusations and handled them roughly, pushing and slapping them in public for some hours. Finally they were handed over to the Police who produced them before the Court on 5th November.
The complainants, said to be Hindutva extremists, are : Dhiren Rout, Sashikanta Biswal, Jagdish Bal, Sanjay Barik, Sanatana Das, Surendra Sahu, Bikash Ranjan Das and Fakir Mohan Senapati and many other villagers who filed a case no.222/04.11.08 on 153, 34 IPC against the staff of the NGO.The injured persons namely Bikram Keshari Senapati and Budhiram Sethi who belong to Hindu radical groups also lodged a separate case against them vide No. 223/04.11.08 on 279 and 337 IPC. The social workers have also filed a counter case against these perpetrators vide case no. 224/04.11.08 on 143,341,323,294,354 and 149 IPC.
GCIC is following up the matter. Please pray as these persons are being harassed by the Hindu fanatics who were after them for long.
