Ranchi, May 30: A small group of faceless people, mostly senior citizens and women, assembled at St Paul’s Cathedral here this evening and prayed for peace in Jharkhand.

The special assembly came when members of the Sangh parivar, including top BJP leaders like chief minister Arjun Munda, his predecessor Babulal Marandi and Union minister Karia Munda, have begun pointing fingers at the church for its “role” in the violence during the teacher recruitment test.

The Vishwa Hindu Parishad has described the mayhem as the result of a “dangerous conspiracy being hatched by the Christian missionaries since the formation of Jharkhand”.

“It is confounding why there was trouble only in a handful of schools, all run by the mission, during the examinations. The government should sternly deal with the threat and order a judicial probe into the disturbances,” VHP functionary Ganga Prasad Yadav said.

But the prayer at the cathedral was far removed from the concerted political onslaught being made on the church. St Paul’s represents a significant denomination of Christians in Jharkhand, those belonging to the Church of North India, a successor of the Anglican Church. Two other denominations — Roman Catholic and Gossner Evangelical Lutheran — command a sizeable following in the state. “These prayers are for the welfare of Jharkhand. We seek God’s help in restoring peace and tolerance in the state,” said a young girl while leading the prayer.

Church sources said it was “grossly incorrect” on the part of some senior officials and politicians to blame it for the trouble from May 26 to May 28. “Anyone can make allegations. But it is the duty of a conscientious administration to examine a charge threadbare before projecting it as the truth. This did not happen in this case. This smacks of intolerance and communal bias,” the sources said.

Sources in the BJP admitted that blaming the mission was a good diversionary tactic. “The state is heading towards elections. Obviously, a section of the party is looking for opportunities to bring to the fore the social differences on religious lines. In the tribal pockets of the state, the RSS, VHP and allied organisations have been acting as a ‘counter’ to the church for several decades,” the sources said. The church has a substantial presence in the tribal pockets of Jharkhand since decades. Apart from other establishments, it has been running a large number of schools in the state.

“It is true that trouble erupted in some schools run by the mission in and around Ranchi. But the fact that most schools in the state are run by the church itself cannot be ignored. There was general resentment, which surfaced on May 27. It is just a coincidence that it came to the fore in mission schools. Non-mission centres like Ranchi College and Sanjay Gandhi College were also disturbed,” church sources said.

“The Sangh outfits have a history of blaming the mission for all kinds of troubles in the tribal areas. That has been the general tendency of saffron organisations,” the sources added.

But the VHP functionary said certain forces, which were being funded by foreign agencies, were bent upon converting Jharkhand into “another Nagaland and Mizoram”.