India's Supreme Court issued an interim order on Feb. 18 directing that no further exhumation of buried Christian bodies take place in the central state of Chhattisgarh. The order responded to a petition filed by the Chhattisgarh Association for Justice and Equality, which cited hundreds of cases over two years in which Hindu fundamentalist groups dug up Christian dead bodies buried in ancestral tribal villages.

The Catholic Church in India welcomed the ruling. But church leaders say it is not nearly enough.

Archbishop Victor Henry Thakur of Raipur, the capital of Chhattisgarh, told EWTN News on Feb. 20: "Relief is not enough. We want justice."

Christians account for less than 2% of Chhattisgarh's 25 million people. That a population this small requires Supreme Court intervention just to keep its dead in the ground tells you everything about the scale of what is happening.

Graves dug up, bones burned

The details emerging from Chhattisgarh's tribal regions are not abstract policy disputes. They are visceral.

Arun Pannalal, a leader of the Chhattisgarh Christian Forum, told EWTN News on Feb. 22:

"Even a 20-year-old grave was dug up, bones collected and burnt. Even the family of the deceased was forced to dig out and burn the bones."

Forced to desecrate their own family's remains. That is not a land-use disagreement. That is coercion designed to humiliate.

While Catholics in the region typically bury their dead in cemeteries, other Christian denominations in remote tribal villages have long buried the dead in ancestral lands. Archbishop Thakur noted that this practice was never contested until recently, when "politically motivated and sponsored groups" began opposing it. Father Sebastian Poomattam, vicar general of the Archdiocese of Raipur, described the exhumation campaign as "a new strategy initiated by the Hindu nationalists to marginalize Christians."

The ecumenical United Christian Forum held a news conference in New Delhi on Feb. 19 under the title "No Rest Even in Death for Christians in India." UCF coordinator A.C. Michael, a Catholic, laid out the mechanics of exclusion:

"Christian families are often forced to abandon Christian burial customs and adopt the practices of the majority religion as a precondition for interment in their own villages."

Bury your dead our way, or don't bury them at all. That is the choice being imposed on Indian Christians in tribal Chhattisgarh.

The court gave with one hand and withheld with the other

Two days before the exhumation order, on Feb. 16, the same Supreme Court refused to overturn a separate Chhattisgarh High Court ruling. That ruling found that village notice boards banning the entry of Christian pastors, priests, and "converted Christians," erected by local Gram Sabha councils, were not unconstitutional.

Several villages in tribal areas have now posted these notices, declaring the entry of pastors and priests "strictly prohibited."

Archbishop Thakur called the signs what they are:

"It is unfortunate that the Supreme Court dismissed the plea challenging the Chhattisgarh High Court ruling on village hoardings that ban the entry of Christian pastors, priests, and 'converted Christians' by the Gram Sabha were not unconstitutional."

He added that such notices "seem very discriminatory, as it violates the constitutional rights of citizens to free movement and the right to propagate religion."

Father Poomattam warned that the judiciary's refusal to act would only accelerate the problem:

"The refusal of the judiciary to stop such blatant violation of fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution will only aggravate the situation. This will only embolden the fundamentalists."

So the court halted grave desecrations but left standing a regime where Christians can be formally barred from entering their own villages. The dead get a reprieve. The living do not.

A pattern that extends beyond one state

Chhattisgarh is not an isolated case. The UCF's 2025 report identified the state as "the No. 1 leading state in assaults against Christians with 47 incidents of reported violence." The organization has also reported that Christians in the state face social boycott, including denial of access to public water sources and subsidized government rations, while police stand by.

In neighboring Odisha, the situation has turned lethal. In late January, tribal relatives killed a Christian convert couple, Jitendra Soren and his wife Malati, along with their 15-year-old daughter Sasmita, in Keonjhar District. Two younger siblings survived the attack.

A family of five targeted for their faith. Three killed. The perpetrators were their own relatives.

Religious liberty advocates in the West spend enormous energy on causes that pale in comparison to what is unfolding across central and eastern India. Christians in Chhattisgarh are not fighting over pronoun policies or corporate diversity statements. They are fighting for the right to bury their dead and walk into their own villages.

Fresh pressure in Jagdalpur

Even as the Supreme Court order settles, new tensions are surfacing. Father Thomas Vadakkumkara, vicar general of the Syro-Malabar Diocese of Jagdalpur in Chhattisgarh, shared details of a fresh confrontation. Local Hindus complained to the government that their "goddess" had disappeared because of the Church's presence, prompting Bishop Joseph Kollamparambil to travel to the remote tribal village to meet with officials.

The Church has operated in that village for 28 years. As Vadakkumkara put it: "How does such a case crop up now?"

The answer is obvious. These are not organic disputes bubbling up from ancient grievances. They are coordinated pressure campaigns targeting a religious minority that lacks the numbers to fight back through democratic channels. Archbishop Thakur identified the force behind it plainly: "politically motivated and sponsored groups."

Religious persecution that deserves the name

There is a strange asymmetry in how the international community and Western media treat religious persecution. When the targets are certain groups in certain countries, the coverage is immediate, and the moral framework is clear. When the targets are Christians, particularly Christians in nations that are strategic partners of the West, the coverage thins and the language softens.

What is happening in Chhattisgarh fits every definition of religious persecution:

• Dead bodies are exhumed and burned based on the deceased's faith
• Families coerced into abandoning religious burial practices
• Village-level entry bans targeting Christians by name
• Denial of public water and government rations as punishment for religious affiliation
• 47 reported incidents of violence against Christians in a single state in a single year
• A convert family of five was attacked by their own relatives, three were killed

India's constitution guarantees freedom of religion and the right to propagate one's faith. The gap between that guarantee and the reality on the ground in Chhattisgarh is not a crack. It is a chasm.

The Supreme Court's interim order is a start. But an interim order protecting the dead while the living remain subject to bans, boycotts, and violence is not justice. It is a holding pattern. And the people enduring it know the difference.