The Angami Baptist Church Council (ABCC) has strongly condemned the motive behind the ‘Assam Healing (Prevention of Evil) Practices Bill 2024’ stating that the bill is nothing less than “an attempt to target Christians whose long historical wholistic endeavour of serving humanity and upliftment of the poor, the marginalized and the downtrodden”
On 26th February, the Assam Government passed the Assam Healing (Prevention of Evil) Practices Bill 2024 that bans non-scientific or ‘magical’ healing with “ulterior motives for exploiting the innocent people and thereby destroying the fibre of public health of the society”. While announcing the Cabinet’s approval for the Bill, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who also holds the Home portfolio, had said, “We are going to pilot this bill because we believe the religious status quo is very important for a proper balance.” Sarma also claimed that healing is “used to convert tribal people.”
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ABCC, in a statement released on Thursday, stated that it is “deeply disturbed by such blatant religious bigotry from a leading figure of the North East whose leadership and influence has far reaching effect in the region he represents and beyond.” Stating that such discriminatory statements cannot bring about “religious status quo” and achieve “proper balance”, the Council alleged that Assam CM’s statement was “self-contradictory, misleading, discriminatory and has serious communal overtones, and it plainly reflects the motive of the bill”.
This bill is nothing less than an attempt to target Christians whose long historical wholistic endeavour of serving humanity and upliftment of the poor, the marginalized and the downtrodden is an indisputable fact, ABCC has said.
While maintaining that ‘Christian healing ministry’ involves both scientific as well as divine practices (through prayer), the Council asserted that it has nothing to do with ‘magical healing’
What is more misleading is to equate ‘magical healing’ with proselytization, ABCC stated, adding that Christians pray to God for healing in response to human suffering and pain and not in an attempt to change their beliefs.
The ‘Assam Healing (Prevention of Evil) Practices Bill 2024′ is said to aim at “eliminating non-scientific healing practices’ and rather it will simply “alienate us from each other and further polarize communities”, ABCC’s Executive Director Rev Dr Rachülie Vihieno stated. The Council prays that the sister-states of the North East India exemplify what it means to live in peaceful co-existence and show the way in a nation marred by division and intolerance, he added.
