New Delhi, January 24, 1999 : Shri Ashok Singhal, Working President
of Vishva Hindu Parishad has issued a statement that "Vishva Hindu
Parishad strongly condemns the ghastly inhuman act of burning alive the
Australian Padre and his two innocent children sleeping in a jeep at
night between 22nd and 23rd January, 1999 at the village Manoharpur,
District Keonjhar , Orissa,and demands that the state and central
governments should thoroughly enquire into the dastardly incident and
punish the guilty immediately to check recurrence of such incidents. "
He condemned at the same time the tendency of political parties to
politicise the issue to gain political mileage out of it by involving
the names of Vishva Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal before checking the
facts.
The VHP leader maintained that Vishva Hindu Parishad is definitely
against foreign missionaries who indulge in fraudulent conversion of
simple unsuspecting tribal people in the name of charitable work, which
VHP considers immoral and anti-national . However VHP does not believe
in violent retaliation but challenges them through constructive work of
service projects in education, health and Dharma.
Shri Singhal has clarified that VHP or Bajrang Dal does not have any
unit in the said area where the incident ttook place, nor the person
responsible for it, Dara Singh, as reported in the newspapers, has any
connection wih Bajrang Dal.t The said person who has a criminal record
according to the information gathered by our sources, is wanted by the
police for last few months who have issued a warrant against him.
Incapability of police to apprehend him all these previous months places
the responsibility of the incident on the police itself.
Shri Singhal has therefore demanded immediate impartial inquiry into the
incident to bare the facts and to stop the motivated propaganda against
VHP and Bajrang Dal.