Police opened fire on a crowd of 1,000 angry Hindus attacking a police station in eastern India, killing one person in a district wracked by a month of Hindu-Christian violence, authorities said Wednesday. The mob, most of them women, surrounded the police station Tuesday in Raikia, a small town in Orissa state, demanding that police release two locals arrested in connection with recent Hindu-Christian clashes, said Kishore Pradhan, a local police officer. When officials tried to convince the crowd to disperse, the protesters began to pelt them with stones, injuring 12 police and paramilitary troops. The troops first tried to disperse them using bamboo batons and firing warning shots, Pradhan said. When the crowd refused to leave, officers opened fire with live ammunition, killing one man and injuring another, he said. Raikia is in Kandhamal district, where Hindu-Christian clashes broke out on Aug. 24 following the killing of Hindu religious leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati. At the time, police blamed Maoist rebels active in the area for the killings, but right-wing Hindu groups blamed local Christians and set fire to a Christian orphanage. The violence then spread to include mob attacks on churches, shops and homes. The death toll from four weeks of violence has risen to 26. Right-wing Hindu mobs have also attacked more than 20 churches and prayer halls in the southern state of Karnataka on Sept. 14, injuring at least 34 people including five police.
