The chief minister of an Indian state has said he plans to amend a law to provide capital punishment for those engaged in religious conversions, increasing safety concerns among Christians and Church workers in central India.
Newsroom (17/03/25 10:40, Gaudium Press) Mohan Yadav, chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, told a public meeting last week in the state capital Bhopal, that he plans to amend the state’s existing anti-conversion to punish those engaging in forced or fraudulent religious conversions with the death penalty.
He said the state has legal provision to punish those who rape minors with death penalty. In a similar line, the state will punish those engaged in religious conversion through fraudulent means with the death penalty.
“Religious conversion will not be tolerated,” Yadav asserted amid loud applause from the audience in the state, known as the hotbed of anti-Christian violence in the country.
Christian leaders say Yadav’s announcement makes Christian life even more dangerous in a state where a Hindu-leaning government continues in power.
“It is like adding fuel to the fire,” says Jerry Paul, national president of the Sarva Isai Mahasabha (All Christian Federation) based in Bhopal.
He said Hindu activists, who support the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), “have been unleashing a wave of targeted attacks against our people and our institutions alleging religious conversion.”
Yadav’s call for the death penalty for religious conversion “will only help embolden the Hindu hardliners to step up attacks against us…now we face greater risk for our safety and security,” Paul said.
Madhya Pradesh is among 11 Indian states where anti-conversion laws have criminalized religious conversion through allurement, force, and coercion, among other means.
The state amended its more than five decades-old anti-conversion law in 2021 by adding harsher punishment, including jail terms of up to 10 years for violations.
He said that often, the law is selectively applied against Christians and Muslims because its provisions are not applied against Hindus who use force to convert Muslims and Christians.
“We welcome the chief minister’s announcement, provided it should not be discriminatory and applicable to all religious communities,” he said.
However, he said Christians “do not support capital punishment as we believe every human life is a gift of God. So, in any case, we cannot support this law.”
Muslim cleric Maulana Umar Quasmi said Yadav’s announcement was “aimed at creating hatred among the minority communities who have already been victimized.”
The BJP-led government has enough majority in the state assembly to amend the anti-conversion law and include the death penalty.
But the move “will aggravate the persecution against minorities, especially Muslims and Christians,” Quasmi stated.
Daniel John, a Catholic leader based in Bhopal, said the Indian constitution guarantees the freedom for all citizens to choose a religion of their choice, practice it, and propagate it.
For Christians, “there is nothing called forced conversion because conversion happens in the heart…the allegation of forced religious conversion is a creation of Hindu hardliners to target the minorities,” he said.
- Raju Hasmukh with files from UCAN News
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