Anto Akkara

Foreword

Books relating to the Partition narrate only what happened to Hindus or Muslims. It is understandable because India was divided on the basis of religion. Muslims had demanded a homeland of their own. The British, before quitting, drew a line on the basis of religion, integrating the Muslim majority areas into a separate country, Pakistan.

One thought that after the Partition, the distance between the Hindus and the Muslims would diminish. But it has not been so. Both communities still carry the baggage of the Partition when over one million were butchered and nearly 40 million were uprooted from both sides.

The way in which the Hindutva supporters spread terror in Odisha indicates primarily the weakening of the secular ethos.

The atrocities and the fraud committed in Kandhamal in 2008, now brought to the fore, may irk the conscience of people even belatedly. If it does happen in the case of many and make them assert themselves against the communal forces, Anto Akkara, the author of the investigative book ‘Who killed Swami Laxmanananda?’, would have contributed a lot to pluralism, which sustains the structure of democracy.

The perpetrators of death, rape and arson during riots have escaped with no or very little punishment. The entire episode of Kandhamal requires another look even though it is late. The gravity of such incidents should never be diminished or hidden. They must be publicised so as to make the nation realise how it is slowly and gradually slipping into the maelstrom of communalism, hatred and enmity from which it would be difficult for the people to extract themselves out.

The idea of India for which thousands of people have sacrificed their lives is endangered once again. If the guilty are brought to the book it may be possible to regain faith in the Indian Constitution that consecrates the freedom struggle and ensures every Indian citizen is equal before the law. Secularism may also begin to breathe again. Otherwise, the lengthening shadows of communalism may darken the nation’s future for a long time to come.

Kuldip Nayar

Veteran Journalist and Author

Preface

My Engagement with Kandhamal

Part I What happened in Kandhamal?

1 Funeral procession triggers anarchy
- Funeral procession across Kandhamal
- Repetition of Godhra procession
- Togadia escorted to Kandhamal
- Togadia’s entry banned in 2015
- Church desecrated before police
- Arson along funeral procession route
- State government absolves itself
- Lofty constitutional guarantees reduced to ashes
2 ‘National shame’
- Burning bodies to deny compensation
- FIR filed only if the body traced
- Dead body disappears when wife goes to police
- Slain Pastor’s wife intimidated
- Even Hindus not spared
- Targets chosen carefully
3 Rape as a weapon
- Nun’s rape and government apathy
- Government kept nun’s rape under carpet
- Hindu student gang-raped, burnt alive
- Hindu girl raped for uncle’s refusal to reconvert
- Heavy toll on pregnant mothers, infants
4 Propaganda turns sheep into wolves
- ‘Christians killing each other’
- BJP leader, Chief Minister confirm Sangh Parivar role
- Demonstration for arrest of raped nun
- Nun’s rape only an ‘ecclesiastical afterthought’
- RSS condemns elderly nun’s rape
- Christian ‘conspiracy’ behind BJD dumping BJP
- BJP double-speak on Kandhamal
5 Fence eats crop
- Police open church gate for desecration
- Insensitive guardians of law
- Criticise bigots, police will act
- Shocking acquittal in policeman’s killing
- Fast Track to justice or injustice?
- Widow threatened for pursuing justice
- Not guilty of crime but guilty of destroying evidence
- Awaiting ‘fair and just trial’
- Need for retrial like Best Bakery and SIT into Kandhamal

Part II Travesty of Justice

1 Innocents incarcerated
- First batch of Swami’s ‘killers’
- First catch – 13-year old boy and Pastor cousin
- Branded ‘killer’ when out to buy medicine
- Trip home turned him Swami’s ‘killer’
- Forced confession made him ‘killer’
- Saffron brigade called police, Pastor became ‘killer’
- Catholic lawyer among Swami’s ‘killers’
- Seven innocents chained together
- Lie detection test for ‘killers’ caught by saffron mob
2 Travails of innocent seven
- Lamb branded wolf
- Unforgettable meeting between father and son
- Hindu villagers vouch for Bhaskar’s innocence
- Tormented families
- ‘Dumb’ man among seven convicts
- Being popular proves costly
- Conspiracy cooked up
- Harsh on the family
- Charged with murder despite being away
- Axe planted by police nailed him
- Son threatened to trap father
- Friendship with police no help
3 Baffling conviction
- Swami was a ‘fundamentalist’ too
- Third gun mystery – blunder or distortion by the judge?
- Laurels for prosecution, witnesses
- Castle built on loose sand
4 Questionable evidence
- Church record fabricated ‘to prove’ conspiracy
- Shocker for Sangh Parivar: Beticola resolution was ‘forged’
- ‘Missionary-Maoist conspiracy’ too falls apart
- Grandiose witness plot that crumbled
- Entry of fresh witnesses
- Murder conspiracy ‘finalised’ on busy road
- Acquittal on mobile theft charge
- Bhaskar’s ‘Maoist’ connection
- Students of Sanskrit have ‘high memory power’
- Delaying tactics – prosecution ploy
- Long delay in reaching High Court order
5 NHRC’s dubious role
- NHRC whitewashed Kandhamal
- Contrasting response to Gujarat and Kandhamal
- Kandhamal blacked out?
- NHRC’s obsession with conversion theory
- NHRC’s ‘detectives’ ignore refugee plight
6 Who will treat the doctor?
- Police Medal for officer with ‘deplorable’ conduct
- Strict rule for visiting innocent convicts
- Human bones turn animal bones in forensic testing
- ‘Murderers may be innocents’ – Justice Mahapatra....
- Murder accused MLA sentry at court
- Instant bail for MLA from High Court
- Contrast: Gujarat High Court cancelled bail to minister
- Chief Justice Thakur held out hope

Part III Kandhamal Fraud

1 ‘Christian conspiracy’ exposed
- Togadia claims ‘Christian conspiracy’
- Togadia drags in the Pope
- Swami’s murder was a ‘gift to the Lord’
- Roots of Beticola resolution
- Protests continue despite High Court order for retrial
- Saffron silence after conviction of innocent Christians
- Beticola resolution was ‘forged’, no Maoist link
2 India Foundation - saffron truth factory
- ‘Harvest of Hate – Kandhamal in Crossfire’
- Saffron ‘gift’ to church leader
- Enter Brannon Parker
- Kandhamal riddle: Which Parker is real? Michael, Brannon ....
- Parker books cast in saffron
- Christians own 27 percent of the land in India!
- Mysterious India Foundation
- India Foundation office: Flat owned by National Security....
- Lulu.com @ saffron master’s service
- With BJP in power, India Foundation comes out....
- RSS offshoots
3 ‘The Agony of Kandhamal’
- Renowned sand artist roped in for saffron propaganda
4 Who killed the Swami?
- ‘Papa ki Beti’
- Swami’s boastful claim
- Pope and Sonia Gandhi named as conspirators
- Evidence strengthens suspicion
- Clues from UN corridors
- Who killed Parvat Panigrahi?
- Cover-up with fake Parker books
- Ram Madhav's admission
- Confessions that confirm the conspiracy
5 Saner voices
- Anguish of a Hindu mother
- Who is a Hindu?
- ‘Christian’ funeral for a Hindu
- Christians ordered ‘to cremate’ dead
- Hindu punished even after death of ‘Christian’ wife
- Hindu caterer eager to help refugees
- Apologetic Hindus hold out hope
- Waning animosity in Dangdia
- Flower from assailant on New Year day
- Melting hearts
- “We have been fooled.”
- Sarpanchs speak: “It will not be repeated.”
- No ‘harvest of hate’ from Kandhamal

Satyameva Jayate

Appendix - Brief Facts of the Case

Abbreviations

Index

References

Tributes to the Book

Preface

Would you believe that the ground zero of one of the shocking frauds in the history of independent India was the remote jungle district of Kandhamal in Odisha? Passionate intellectuals and human rights activists would remember how Kandhamal went up in flames and the Christians were hounded up like aliens in late 2008. But, an overwhelming majority of Indians have dismissed the Kandhamal conflagration as a footnote in the annals of history.

No, Kandhamal is a pestering wound in the body politic of the Indian Republic that was born with the infamous partition of 1947. Kandhamal carries the yoke of an appalling fraud and travesty of justice making a mockery of the fundamental freedom guaranteed under the Constitution. If you are not convinced, kindly search for ‘Kandhamal and Parker’ on the internet. Then the skeleton of this appalling fraud would tumble out.

Following the mysterious murder of 81-year-old Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati on August 23, 2008, Kandhamal went up in flames. Dozens of Christians were killed and 300 churches and 6,000 houses were plundered in unabated violence rendering 56,000 homeless. Eight years later, the lives of thousands of the victims lie shattered like broken glass across sprawling Kandhamal.

Swami Laxmanananda was assassinated on the Hindu sacred night of Janmashtami. Curiously, the trusted bodyguard of the Swami was missing on the day and police guards ran away when the assailants entered the Ashram. Doctors who were rushed to the Ashram in the jungle from far off centres were asked to ‘hurry up’ with the token post mortem held in the Ashram compound itself in the night. Even before the sunrise, preparations were complete for the zigzag funeral procession crisscrossing Kandhamal for two days calling for revenge on Christians.

Within hours of Swami’s murder, four Christians including a 13-year old illiterate boy were picked up by Saffron henchmen, thrashed and dumped in police stations. Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) leader Praveen Togadia announced the names of ‘Swami’s killers’, and not the police. That is how the nation was fooled about the ‘Christian conspiracy’ behind the Swami’s murder.

When the police could not fix the ‘first batch of killers’ who had been detained for 40 days, they were let off with an affidavit: “Due to fear, we had taken shelter in police station.”

Then the investigation team arrested the ‘second batch of killers’ - 7 innocent Christians from remote Kotagarh jungle in two batches. During four years of trial of the accused in the Fast Tract Court, hardly any worthwhile evidence was brought before the two judges. Biranchi N Mishra, the Fast Track Court judge who had presided over the final two years of the trial, was transferred in 2013 before delivering the verdict.

Was it because the judge had pulled up the prosecution several times prodding why they wanted to keep the accused in detention and even recorded that the conduct of the Investigating Officer was ‘deplorable’? Ironically, the Investigating Officer Santosh Kumar Patnaik was conferred with the Police Medal after the judge made this adverse remark

The shocking verdict - convicting the 7 accused Christians to life imprisonment - was delivered abruptly by a newly appointed third judge in October 2013. Their bail plea was bluntly dismissed by the Odisha High Court in 2014 and the appeals are yet to be heard.

Two years after this conviction, the same police officers who had ensured the conviction of the innocent Christians told the Justice Naidu Commission of Inquiry that the much trumpeted ‘Christian conspiracy’ theory was baseless.

While pursuing the poignant saga of seven Christians - six of them illiterates - being tried for the sensational murder, I stumbled upon this mammoth fraud from secret RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) creations on Kandhamal. Ram Madhav, RSS spokesperson, had gifted - foolishly or arrogantly - this vital set of documents to Archbishop Andrews Thazhath of Thrissur, head of the Kerala Catholic Church, during his visit ‘to promote harmony’ in 2012.

Since the church official was well aware of my passion for Kandhamal, he handed over the vital documents to me promptly. Believe it or not, I happened to be at home in Thrissur on a family emergency and I had contacted the church official with a news query minutes before Madhav arrived. This RSS gift paved the way for blowing the lid off the Kandhamal fraud.

After screening these documents, I was convinced that an octopus had been at work behind the Kandhamal fraud and travesty of justice, and had been on its trail. Three years after I got the golden treasure, the explosive value of the RSS products stuck me. That was when I succeeded in verifying that the contact address of dubious India Foundation - that was behind the fake books and DVD on Kandhamal. It was a flat owned by none other than Ajit Kumar Doval, appointed as National Security Advisor of the nation by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on assuming office after winning the election in May 2014.

Among the various India Foundation products was a dubious book on Kandhamal that had been published under different titles and fake ‘US authors’ Michael Parker and Brannon Parker. The first one ‘Harvest of Hate - Kandhamal in Crossfire’ carried a ‘Publisher’s Note’ by India Foundation director Nirmala Sitharaman’ who is presently a minister under Prime Minister Modi. The second book ‘Kandhamal Burning - Orissa in the Crossfire’ had been even presented to the US State Department to fool it with the Sangh Parivar propaganda.

Another masterpiece from the India Foundation that can be dubbed as ‘saffron truth factory’ is the DVD titled ‘The Agony of Kandhamal’. The DVD that masqueraded Hindus as the victims and that too by forging testimonies of battered Christian victims betrayed the real agenda behind the Swami’s murder. Kandhamal conflagration was the outcome of an elaborate conspiracy to test the Christian allegiance of Sonia Gandhi of Italian Catholic origin, then chairperson of UPA (United Progressive Alliance) government led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Shockingly, even the National Human Rights Commission has played a dubious role in the Kandhamal cover-up. The nation will be stunned to know that despite the massive bloodshed and brutality heaped on a hapless minority, NHRC has not issued even a press release on Kandhamal in eight years while its investigative reports on the violence read like press release of the Sangh Parivar.

This book is a collection of alarming facts that I have stumbled upon or unearthed during 23 arduous trips to Kandhamal and elsewhere in the pursuit of truth and justice while accompanying a voiceless people.

The saffron truth factory led by an ‘octopus’ have worked meticulously to perpetuate the fraud and the travesty of justice. But, the ‘harvest of hate’ from bloodied Kandhamal has been frustrating for the Sangh Parivar as the refrain among the Hindu majority of Kandhamal is: “We have been fooled.”

Though the Sangh Parivar denounces him, Kandhamal has indeed proved right Mahatma Gandhi, the prophet of non-violence and the Father of the Nation: “What is obtained by hatred proves a burden in reality for it increases hatred.”

Sadly, seven innocent Christians are languishing in jail for a crime they never committed - leaving a blot on the judicial system of the country. Truth cannot be kept under the carpet for ever. As the motto of the nation proclaims, ‘Satyameva Jayate’ (truth alone triumphs).

Anto Akkara

Who Killed Swami Laxmanananda?

'Who Killed Swami Laxmanananda?' is the masterpiece of the journalist author's relentless pursuit of Truth and Justice for Kandhamal. The investigative book, with Foreword by Kuldip Nayar, patriarch of Indian Journalism, exposed the Kandhamal fraud and 'demolished' the Christian conspiracy theory.

It conclusively proved that seven innocent Christians - six of them illiterates - had been fraudulently convicted for the Swami's murder to perpetrate the Kandhamal fraud. Released in New Delhi, Hyderabad, Kochi, Bangalore, Bhubaneswar etc, this book took the lid off the Kandhamal fraud.

Two honest Fast Track Court judges were transferred and a third one gave the conviction verdict which a legal luminary told me is 'written outside'. It is part of a shocking fraud planned and executed from Delhi to target Sonia Gandhi when she was UPA chairperson. Sensational evidences have been knit like a garland and presented in the investigative book that names even key conspirators in Modi government.

Propaganda DVD the RSS has produced under the name 'The Agony of Kandhamal'. It has been uploaded on the YouTube.

Shockingly, seven innocent convicts are languishing in jail for a crime they never committed. In fact, the convicted seven are the 'second batch of Swami's killers'. Within hours of Swami's murder, four Christians including a 13-year old boy were picked up by Sangh Parivar, thrashed and handed over to the police. It was Praveen Togadia who announced the names of these 'killers' and not the police.

When the police could not fix these seven, they got the second batch of killers from remote jungle. When the second Fast Track Court judge took on the prosecution, he was transferred and the Crime Branch officer who cooked up the cock and bull story was conferred ‘police medal’. Seven years after the shocking conviction, the appeal is dragging on in the Odisha High Court.

(Note: Though all the seven ‘innocents’ walked to freedom by December 2019 on bail from the Supreme Court of India, the appeal against their questionable conviction remains pending before the Odisha High Court even in 2020 – raising questions over the pressure on the judicial system.)

Foreword

Kandhamal is still awaiting justice. The criminals who, in the name of defending Hinduism, went around burning houses and churches, chopped into pieces Christians unwilling to renounce faith and reconvert to Hinduism, and systematically spread hatred leading to the bloodshed in the idyllic region, are still roaming free. Only a couple of convictions have been delivered. The two Fast Track Courts have proved to be utterly ineffective due to intimidation of witnesses, poor investigation and deliberately toned down FIRs. The higher judiciary has done little and the National Human Rights Commission that has accumulated massive submissions from the affected people and fact-finding missions has exposed its bankruptcy as a protector of constitutional rights.

The much-awarded, well-known journalist Anto Akkara whose earlier investigative book ‘Kandhamal: a blot on Indian Secularism’ stirred the nation in 2009 exposing the details of the mayhem and the tragedy in Kandhamal, has now come out with yet another significant volume. This presents much new material based on close monitoring of the court proceedings, ground level reports and interviews with numerous people in Kandhamal, Odisha and in other parts of the country. What strikes the reader most is its attempt to present facts as truthfully as possible. The statements may be contested by some, but the challenge is to provide counter-facts to disprove the account.

The Constitution of India envisages the building of a society that guarantees every individual and every community equal dignity, rights and freedom. That includes ‘freedom of conscience and the right to profess, practice and propagate religion’- the crucial issue in Kandhamal that Akkara has investigated. He chronicles how Hindu fundamentalists were bent on opposing this right. The murder of Swami Lakshmanananda Saraswati who was revered by many in the area was condemned by all, including the Christians, and the Maoists of the region quickly accepted responsibility for it. But instead of following legal course of investigation, the Hindu fundamentalists exploited this incident to spur a tirade against Christians and instigated the attacks on their houses and properties. Akkara raises many new questions on the events of those days and subsequent developments including the ‘mystery’ still surrounding the killing of the Swami

As in Delhi in 1984 and Gujarat in 2002 the failure of the administrative machinery to maintain law and order and prevent the rioters from attacking minorities was evident also in Kandhamal in 2008. Akkara gives even more details about the acquiescent state that were not known before.

The silver lining, however, as Akkara points out, is the role played by many Hindus, representing the tradition of tolerance and syncretism. They protected Christian neighbours and others during the orgy of violence. Two of them even sacrificed their lives in defense of the Christians. Since then majority of the people of Kandhamal belonging to all the communities, SC, ST, OBC, Hindus, Christians and others are engaged in addressing their basic problems of striving for education, employment, forest and land resources and their cultural rights. But the undercurrent of fundamentalism still prevails because the guilty are still not punished.

Amid the emergence of Hindu fundamentalism, the rise of the democratic forces defending human rights of everyone, asserting the multi-religious, secular character of India and carrying on the struggle for peace and freedom is what gives us hope for a bright future. Akkara convincingly shows how Kandhamal continues to be a test case for the struggle for justice, democracy and secularism.

Manoranjan Mohanty

Retired Professor, University of Delhi & Member, People’s Union for Democratic Rights 18 August 2013