Bangalore, Sep 14 (IANS) Around 10 churches and Christian prayers halls were Sunday attacked in Karnataka’s coastal districts of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi by suspected Bajrang Dal activists, the police said.
The attacks, damaging window panes and furniture, were to protest alleged conversion activities, the police said.
“We have not received any report of the people injured in the attacks,” a senior police official said.
There have been attacks on one or two Christian prayer halls in the coffee plantation-rich district of Chikmagalur and central Karnataka district of Davangere earlier this month, the attackers alleging that the churches were enticing Hindus to convert to Christianity.
Hundreds of Christians in Dakshina Kannada district headquarters Mangalore, about 350 km from Bangalore, demonstrated in front of the churches and prayer halls, demanding arrests of the attackers.
At several places in Mangalore city, the agitators clashed with the police who tried to disperse them and also with pro-Hindu groups, a police official said over telephone from Mangalore.
The police used baton and teargas shells to disperse the protesters and banned assembly of five or more people in Mangalore city for three days from Sunday.
Dakshina Kannada police superintendent N. Satish Kumar told IANS that he had held peace meetings with leaders of the two communities to bring back normalcy to the bustling commercial centre.
Satish Kumar later told reporters that the protesters had attacked police personnel. “This is a serious issue and we will take action,” he said.
A police jeep and a private bus were damaged in the stone throwing by the protesters.
Around 10 people were injured in the clashes between Christian groups and pro-Hindu groups and in stone-pelting by the protesters, the police said.
Pro-Hindu groups maintained they did not attack churches but only prayer halls run by some Christian groups whose main activity was, according to them, to convert Hindus.
Central minister Oscar Fernandes, who hails from the region, visited some of the damaged prayers halls Sunday evening.
Meanwhile, C.S. John, founder of the Mission Church in Karnataka, which has around 200 churches in the state, said one of the churches in a village was attacked Sunday morning, the second attack in eight days.
The first attack took place Saturday at a village in Chikmagalur district, he said.
“The attackers manhandled priest Sunil Kumar,” John said. Later, Kumar’s house was also attacked and household articles damaged, he added.