“We won’t let you bury your dead in our land because you and your family left Hinduism to follow a foreign religion,” Hindu supremacists are telling India’s Dalits (untouchables) and tribals (indigenous peoples) who have converted to Christianity. The reasoning of the militant Hindus is rooted in the theo-ideology of Hindutva or Hindu ethnonationalism: “Your rotting corpse will contaminate the sacred soil of Mother India.” Pastor Subhash Baghel’s body was unceremoniously dumped in a hospital morgue for three weeks in the town of Jagdalpur in India’s northern state of Chattisgargh. Hindutva vigilantes wouldn’t let him bury his father in the cemetery where his ancestors were laid to rest.
