In UNITY lies our STRENGTH

The following have been taken [cut and pasted from – Facebook – Badaga Group] and reproduced below as I consider the ‘conversion game’ played by the  ‘newly converted Christian Clan’ needs to be analysed and nipped in the ‘bud’ as the situation after what happened in B.Manihatti is very serious.

Bellie Jayaprakash         6:57pm Jan 11
Our hearts bleed for the ‘brave hearts’ of B.Manihatti people.The first conversion of Badagas to Christianity took place in 1854 when some German missionaries mislead a couple of Badagas in Ketti (Santhoor) with the lure of monetary compensation and false promise of ‘education’ for the children. The seeds of disharmony among these peace loving and innocent people who believed in unity and community living (all the hatti people acted as one) were sown.

Unfortunately, the biggest curse of our people is the disunity combined with jealousy, that is all pervasive. The so called leaders of the community found shelter in politics and corruption with the active support of ‘self appointed Gowdas’ who could be ‘purchased’. The saddest point is that we do not have a selfless Nakku Betta leader after Rao Bahadur Ari Gowder [who passed away in 1971] who can galvanise our people with true leadership qualities.

This is Hethe Habba time. The ALL Mighty Mother Goddess Hethe has saved us from many a disaster. SHE will save us this time also.

Let us be united. In UNITY lies our STRENGTH.

Padmanabhan Ramachandran        7:50pm Jan 11 It is fair to say, there were excellent community leaders till the 1970s. Along with the father-son duo Bellie Gowder and Ari Gowder, there were also stalwarts like Bygamund Haika-mathi Joghee Gowder, Achanakal M Malka Gowder, and much before all of them there was Thuneri headman Padharaja III. Later there were several leaders who were freedom-fighters and selfless servants of Badaga Community. Unfortunately, although unintentional, all the reforms that the early leaders carried out for the Badagas, resulted in Badagas abandoning their age-old occupation of agriculture and cattle and pursuing greener pastures in urban and faraway places. Resulting in a dearth of leaders amongst our community in our homeland. What we are left with is a bunch of selfish crooks in the garb of leaders. Education certainly was essential but education should have been only complementary and for the enhancement of our own way of life. Like how Shiv Khera says, ‘successful people dont do different things, they do things differently’.

Prawin RamBhojan       8:19pm Jan 12

To add to Bellie Jayaprakash from the archives of TOI

Christian missionary efforts at conversion under the guise of social work do not take place in places, say, like the Brahmin-dominated ward of Mylapore in Chennai. They are conducted in poor, illiterate and innocent tribal areas and in remote jungles far from the prying eyes of authority. Now a reaction seems to have set in. Writing in The Statesman (March 12, 1999), Mr B P Saha made the point that “growing enlightenment has been provoking them (tribals) to dislike conversion and look askance at the foreign missionaries, the so-called benefactors”.

Attempts at conversion should be considered a mortal assault on local cultures and should be totally banned. Conversions are forbidden by law in China. Here we take a lenient view of conversion and Christian bodies have been taking advantage of the Hindu sense of tolerance. According to Mr Jon Stock, New Delhi correspondent of the British paper The Daily Telegraph, “put simply, the Indian subcontinent has become the principal target for a wide range of western Christian missions which are determined to spread the gospel to India’s ‘unreached’ people before the year 2000”.

Writing in The Spectator, Mr Stock says: “There is little doubt that the current communal tension in India would not be serious if foreign-funded missionaries had been content with giving Indians the choice of Christianity and left it at that.”

According to Mr Stock, “hundreds of thousands of dollars are being channelled into India through well-organised, America-based evangelical missions”, the meticulously researched ethnographic data they are compiling on the region ensuring that funds are being directed “with military precision to the right area, even to specific pin codes in remote tribal districts”.

Mr Stock quoted a statement from a Colorado-based Group of World- wide Christian Missions calling itself AD 2000 and Beyond as saying: ” ‘Flashes of light’ seen all around the North India-Hindu belt, particularly among the tribal groups, are encouraging us to believe that the Sum of Righteousness is indeed ready to rise upon these unreached peoples.”