A little-known organisation until a few years ago, Christian Association and Alliance For Social Change (CASA), now seems to be at the forefront of every controversy related to Christianity in Kerala – be it regarding a movie titled ‘Eesho’ (Jesus Christ in Malayalam) or over allegations of ‘love jihad’ and ‘halal food’. CASA is once again in the spotlight with the recent controversy over an interfaith marriage of a Christian nurse and a DYFI leader. CASA offered its support to the family of the woman right by organising a march to the police station and also assisted in filing a habeas corpus petition in the Kerala High Court. Strongly aligning with the views of RSS-BJP, Kochi-born CASA has spread its wings to Canada, Australia, Israel etc. Though CASA’s Facebook posts often carry polarising and vicious statements, it is gaining support among the Christian community.
Speaking to this reporter, CASA president Kevin Peter, a Kochi native, explained their activities, plans, politics and more. Peter, 48, is among the seven founders of CASA, which now has over 5,000 members. Peter said that four of its initial founders have seen their daughters marrying Muslim men. He said Christian priests, former police and intelligence officers, who do not wish to be named, are part of their advisory team. Members of 17 Christian denominations in Kerala, except Jehovah’s Witnesses are also part of CASA.
Here are the edited excerpts from the interview.
What is CASA? What are your activities and plans?
CASA became an active organisation after registering as a society in 2019. However, its origin happened in connection with the execution of Saddam Hussein in 2006. If you remember, there was a hartal (shutting down of shops, offices as a mark of sorrow or protest) in Kerala in connection with the execution. The hartal supporters, led by former MLA V K Ebrahim Kunju, disrupted the functioning of Cochin carnival. A disappointed group started the carnival heritage protection council, which later became CASA. However, it soon became inactive. The idea of forming an RSS-model organisation for Christians led to its revival during the ‘love jihad’ campaign in 2018. Though I mentioned RSS, we have no plans to use arms like them. Our motto is “My country, my beliefs”, which means we value our belief as well as our land. We have 17 Christian denominations under us, which include Syro Malabar, Latin, Orthodox, Jacobite etc, except the Jehovah’s Witnesses which is theologically different. We accept members only after carefully scrutinising their ID, parish details and their social media accounts to ensure that they are not anti-national or too communal. We have over 5,000 members, of which 2,000 are active. We don’t have direct links with the Church, but have priests, former police and intelligence officers, lawyers, doctors and other professionals in our advisory committee. Currently the founding members contribute funds for activities. We have got offers of funds from abroad. We will complete the licensing process for that soon.
What are the major initiatives of CASA?
We have intervened in over 200 ‘love jihad’ cases in the state and were able to save around 90 girls. We also check the details in websites (Registration department used to publish notices containing details of couple under special marriage act) to identify ‘love jihad’ cases and alert the local priests. With their help, we meet their families and save girls. From my understanding, in 8 out of 10 cases, girls regret their decision. Also, parents often face ostracism and humiliation. There is only one Bindu Sampath (mother of Nimisha Fatima who joined ISIS) or Ashokan (father of Hadiya who married Shefin Jahan) among thousands. Others are not ready to pursue the fight considering the future of their remaining kids. So we launched a ‘Mission Recall to Christ Love’ to bring back these girls. We brought back around 12 such girls. Of these, we were able to marry off two girls with eligible men from within their communities. These are happening in a secretive manner, we don’t publish such details.
How can you raise allegations of ‘love jihad’ without the support of any facts? In the case of Joisna, who married the DYFI leader, or Jesna Maria James, who has gone missing and is being investigated by the CBI, CASA has alleged ‘love jihad’ angle without any proof. Even the Union Home ministry told Parliament that there was no case of love jihad.
It was not any Hindu or Christian organisations, but Justice K T Sankaran of Kerala High Court who mentioned it first. Also the Union Ministry cannot regsiter a case in the absense of a legal definition for ‘love jihad’. In Joisna’s case, CASA never officially alleged ‘love jihad’. It wasn’t love but a trap. Same gang of people are supporting the couples in all cases, including Joisna’s. Jesna’s missing case was revived only when CASA became a co-petitioner in the Habeas Corpus originally filed by her family. We strongly believe that Islamic groups are behind Jesna’s disappearance.
Several facebook posts of CASA are highly communal and polarising, be it ‘spit jihad’ or ‘love jihad’. Doesn’t this have serious implications on society?
We have never done anything illegal and there aren’t any cases against me, except one related to a Clubhouse discussion. Take for example the case of Easho movie, we registered our protest with the director and requested him to change the name. However, we never threw stones at the houses of actors or the director, we did not organise a protest march or did anything illegal. After exploring all peaceful means, we approached the court. The High Court said they can’t prevent anyone from giving names of gods to films. There wasn’t any protest march like the one by the Islamic organisation after the Hadiya verdict. We accepted the verdict. Yes, our words may be a bit strong, but we engage only in conflict of ideas.
Use of weapons is not the only form of violence. Words too can lead to violence. Why do you think communalism is an answer for communalism? Isn’t it hypocritical to use provocative titles for your short film with a clear intent to trigger religious animosity while you oppose titles like ‘Easho’?
In Kerala, several films had changed names when there was criticism that it would hurt religious sentiments. However, the High Court did not consider our case against the film Easho, even though there was merit in our petition. All organisations, including DYFI and Youth Congress, hailed the verdict. We announced the short film (with a provocative title) when the court said that it can’t prevent use of religious names. The short film was based on a real life child abuse that happened in Assam. However, we didn’t release it. We expected someone to move court against us, but nothing happened. We only wanted to expose double standards in society.
Regarding the contents on the Facebook page of CASA, we believe that attack is the best defence. Why isn’t a world war happening? Why doesn’t Russia attack America or vice versa? They know that the other party has nuclear weapons. Similarly, our posts are our defence. We only try to expose unethical issues in our society. Only extreme step we have taken was regarding the short film, but our intention was to make the court aware of such issues.
Many of the posts of CASA are similar to the stand often taken by BJP-RSS. You have supported NDA during the last Assembly election. Are you in alliance with RSS-BJP?
If someone would raise a question in the 1950-60s, they were tagged a Communist. Now if someone protests against something, they will be termed ‘Sanghi’. Having said that, CASA and Sangh parivar have similar opinions on issues such as CAA-NRC, farmers’ strike, surgical strike etc. Even we feel that reports of attacks against Christians in North India are exaggerated.
We openly stood with the NDA during the last Assembly election. We also supported non-NDA candidates who contested against Muslim League, as we were fed up with issues like the fifth minister controversy. There was a pro-BJP trend during the initial days of election and we expected that we would get one or two Christian MLAs.
Forget any favour, none of the Christian politicians stood for justice in the past few years. P C George is an exception. He can be the leader of Christians in Kerala, but he has his own political ambitions.
Though numbers were not huge, we were able to create a discussion on halal row. Regarding scholarship, appointments etc, the government is into minority appeasement. We are not asking for the share of Muslims to be reduced, but we want the government to treat all as equal. There are a lot of upper caste people, who live in abject poverty. Reservation should be income-based, not caste-based.
