Alleging that a teacher at the Tagalavara Government School has been trying to brainwash the public into converting to Christianity, residents of the village lodged a complaint with the ZP vice-president, deputy director of the Public Education Department and the Block Education Officer.
The villagers said that Narayanaswamy, a teacher at the Government Higher Primary School, would regularly visit their houses, asking them to remove pictures of the Hindu gods, and replace them with pictures of Jesus Christ.
They alleged that he would refer to the Hindu Gods as monkeys and Satans, give them pictures of Christ and cassettes and books about Christianity, and tell them that Christ would bless them if they converted to Christianity.
“Everyday he keeps insisting that we go to the church in Kolar to pray there. He would also ask us to pray to Jesus at our homes everyday, and pester us to rent out a house to him so that he could hold prayer meetings there. When we informed our leader Pratap about this, and advised him that he should not behave this way in school. But now, he has filed a false complaint against us,” the villagers said in the complaint.
They urged the officials to take legal action against them.
Condemned
K V Chowdappa, President, and M Gopala Reddy, Secretary of the Primary School Teachers’ Association have strongly condemned the assault on Narayanaswamy, who was on duty.
“The number of attacks against teachers in the taluk has been increasing of late. Strict action should be taken against those who were involved, else we will have to resort to protest,” they warned. A rasta roko was staged in this connection.