MUMBAI, India – A mob of Hindu nationalists attacked a group of Protestant Christians in an Odisha village on Saturday for resisting alleged pressure to convert to Hinduism, leaving eight injured, Christian leaders said on Sunday.

The injured, attacked while returning from church at Kotamateru village in Odisha state’s Malkangiri district, are being treated at the district hospital, police said, reported The Telegraph.

Odisha, formerly known as Orissa, has a history of anti-Christian violence, and was the spot of an infamous attack on the impoverished Christian minority in August 2008.

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The vast majority of the population of Odisha is Hindu – over 93 percent. The Catholic population is just 2.7 percent.

Christian community leaders pointed a finger at the Bajrang Dal – a Hindu nationalist organization – whose targeting of Christians appears to have gone up in the past year since the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power locally.

Since 2014, India has been ruled by the BJP, which has strong links to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a militant Hindu nationalist organization. Religious minorities have complained of increased harassment since the party took power on a Hindu-first platform.

Incidents of harassment against Christians and other religious minorities have increased across India, with various Christians being detained or arrested for “attempted conversion,” and places of worship being vandalized.

The Bajrang Dal denied involvement in the attacks. A complaint has been registered with Malkangiri police. Local Christians staged a peaceful dharna on Sunday in front of the office of the superintendent of police.

According to Pallab Lima, state general secretary of the Rashtriya Christian Morcha, tension had been building in the area for the last few months.

“Hindu Right-wing activists continued to threaten people to change their religion and accept Hinduism, but many of the people who are Christian by birth resisted,” he said.

“On Saturday morning, while they were returning from prayers, hundreds of people armed with all kinds of weapons like axes, mostly belonging to the Bajrang Dal, attacked the Christian people. The attack went on for hours,” he continued.

Lima said “one individual” was able to contact a district pastor, who immediately informed the Malkangiri police station. The police rescued the Christians and took the “critically injured” to a hospital.

“Because of the remote location of Kotamateru, news of the attack was delayed. On Sunday, we submitted a memorandum to the SP,” Lima said.

He claimed that local Hindutva outfits had launched a “Sanskriti Bachao Abhiyan” (Save Culture Campaign) to pressure Christians into converting to Hinduism.

Bijoy Pusuru, a Christian community leader, said his people are in a state of shock.

“They (those in hospital) are afraid to return to their village (on discharge),” he said.

The police downplayed the violence, blaming it on sibling rivalry.

“The incident was triggered by a dispute between two brothers, one a Christian and the other a Hindu. The Hindu brother was pressuring his Christian sibling to return to the Hindu fold,” inspector Rigan Kinda of Malkangiri police station said, according to the newspaper.

“While members of the Christian community were returning home after prayers at the village church, many Hindus surrounded them and questioned their allegiance to Christianity. An argument broke out and was followed by clashes, in which some people suffered injuries. We are investigating the matter,” the officer said.

District Bajrang Dal leader Sibapada Mirdha denied the accusations of violence or a campaign to convert Christians.

However, in the same breath, he said: “Hindus have been raising their voice against forcible conversions by Christians. Sometimes, there is a spontaneous reaction to this.”

Father Sushil Kumar Gouda, the former director of Social Service Society of the Odisha Dioceses of Beharampur and Rayagyada, said the  Christians in that area are very poor and “suffer tremendously” because of their Christian faith.

“They are in a minority, and they suffer marginalization and social boycott,” he told Crux.

“Instigated by local right-wing elements, tribal Christians are targeted due to clashes between cultural practices of the convert Christians and the local tribals. Harassment and threats are part of their routine existence,” the priest said.

“Besides, this area is a Naxal area, and shares borders with Chhattisgarh and Andhrapradesh, so being Christian is being part of their suffering existence,” he added, referring to the Tribal Christians in those states.

“Yet, their faith remains strong and their courage in the face suffering is a witness of faith. The Tribal Christians living in different villages in Malkangiri district have borne the brunt of a series of anti-Christian violence,” Gouda told Crux.