India: A second state government requests Christian help

On 24 April 2020, UCA News reported that the Madhya Pradesh state government in central India had called on priests, nuns and others from more than a dozen Roman Catholic congregations to carry out a three-day survey of COVID-19 hotspots in the state capital, Bhopal. The groups went from house to house to assess 35,994 people and identify those showing potential COVID-19 infection. Rolf Zeegers, persecution analyst at World Watch Research (WWR), regards this as a positive sign: "This was the second state government to request the help of the Catholic Church. In March 2020, the government of the State of Jharkhand had invited the Catholic Church's participation in COVID-19 relief work (WWR, 1 May 2020). Indian state governments are clearly beginning to recognize the readiness, efficiency and availability for service that Christians can offer. This is an encouraging improvement from the times when Hindu hardliners only despised Christians and their activities. There are many examples of Christian involvement in aid projects for people suffering hardship due to the Corona-crisis lockdown, but it is typical of the "˜secular" media that there is hardly ever any attention paid to these Christian efforts. As a result, anti-Christian sentiments in India will most likely continue unchanged."