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NEW DELHI -- Christian leaders in the state of Orissa and throughout India are supporting a hunger strike beginning 4 September, to bring attention to the persecution of Orissa's Christians. The leaders say the strikers will go on as long as necessary, until legal action to protect Christians from recent violence is taken.

The Hindu group VHP has burned over 4000 homes, destroyed over 100 churches, killed more than 20 Christian believers, and left tens of thousands in relief camps or homeless and hiding in the forest. Two other groups, RSS and Bajrang Dal, have also taken part in the terrorism that targets both Christian and Muslim.

The outcry against the Hindu persecution has reached the president of India. Producer/director Mahesh Bhatt led a delegation to the president, saying, "If the Hindutva Fascist, who led the mayhem in Gujarat in 2002 on Muslims and Christians, [and] this time Orissa, are left allowed, the future of India secularism and democracy is in great danger."

India is constitutionally a secular state, but non-Hindus are regularly denied even basic civil rights. The current movement against Christians dates back to 1999 with the killing of an Austrian missionary, Graham Staine, and his two children.