A month after they were allegedly forced out of their homes in Chhattisgarh's Narayanpur district, tribal Christians have started returning to their villages. However, they say things are not the same as they now live in the fear of being outcasted again.
The Quint visited a few villages in Narayanpur a month after the exodus.
On 18 December 2022, around 300 people from over a dozen villages were allegedly evicted from their homes and chased out of their villages for converting to Christianity. They walked hundreds of kilometers to take shelter at an indoor stadium in Narayanpur.
Even as hundreds remained lodged at the indoor stadium, an anti-Christian rally reportedly led by the Bharatiya Janata Party's Narayanpur district president Roop Sai Salam and others turned violent and vandalised a church and desecrated statues, and attacked the local police, in Narayanpur – further sidelining the tribal Christians.