Articles
The spectral presence of Christians in Indian politics
Opinion | Articles | John Dayal | 27-Nov-2025
There are hardly any Christian MPs and MLAs in India other than those elected on a political party ticket from Kerala, Andhra, Telangana, West Bengal, Karnataka, Goa, Orissa and the tiny-population northeast states of Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Arunachal and Manipur. There are almost none in the Hindi states of the central and northern parts of India. The exception are a very few Adivasis of the Chhotanagpur contiguous belt. The total number of ministers in the Union and state governments must be at its lowest in history.
The vanishing Christian voice in a land where it has sustained itself for two thousand years is a cause of deep worry. This, naturally, must worry the leadership of the Christian community, but it must equally worry those at the highest echelons of governance for its huge implications for the political future and empowerment of the community in the country. This takes on an urgency in the context of special investigations of electoral rolls and other electoral challenges, the decreasing birth rate of the community, the deliberate exclusion of Dalit Christians from seats reserved for Scheduled Castes, and the threat to the Scheduled Tribe status of Christian’s tribals in central and northern states.
Also to be considered is the pressure from the RSS as laid bare in the recent address of Mr Mohan Bhagwat in Bangalore and his references to and on religious minorities. The community—2.3 % of the population, or 2.8 core souls in the 2011 Census—stands as a spectral presence, its feeble voice muffled by the clamour of majoritarian narratives. The 18th Lok Sabha, elected in 2024, best tells this tale: the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance, with 293 seats, boasts not a single Christian MP, a “minority-mukt” group that mocks the republic’s pluralist promise.
The opposition INDIA bloc fares marginally better, with 3.5 % Christian representation—eight MPs from 235 seats—but even this is less than the community’s demographic weight, clocking in at 1.7 % in the Lok Sabha. In the Rajya Sabha, the 2025 elections saw a token presence, clustered in southern and northeastern pockets. This speaks of a geographic political ghettoisation and allows no national or state level brilliant and popular political or social leader to emerge across the vast expanse of the most populous central and northern states. The few that make it to the village panchayats and urban civic bodies remain just there.
Christian MPs and MLAs successfully emerge almost exclusively from Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West Bengal, Karnataka, Goa, Odisha, and from the northeastern bastions of Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, and Manipur—low population states where Christians form from 18 % to 87 % of the populace. In the Hindi heartland—the humungous Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan with their huge populations, and Haryana, Punjab, Himachal, Jammu and Kashmir, and other union territories —their Parliamentary footprint is near-zero, a void that extends to state assemblies.
NCRB data and electoral analysis in 2024-25 did not find Christian MLAs in the Hindi belt where over 40 % of Indians live. Christians are at a historical nadir when it comes to ministerial berths in Union and state governments. Mr Narendra Modi’s third term as prime minister inducted one Christian, Mr. George Kurian, a native of Kerala and brought to the Rajya Sabha as Minister of State for Minority Affairs. His predecessor was Mr. John Barla in 2019 who at least was elected from his home state of West Bengal.
A September 2025 analysis by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW) of 643 ministers across 27 state assemblies and three union territories found that less than 1 % of ministers were Christian, the lowest since Independence. This trajectory of marginalisation and electoral irrelevance portends ill for the political future and empowerment of India’s Christians. It begets policy invisibility, which compounds the demographic headwinds from the RSS, the denial of reservation to Christians of Dalit origin, and existential threats to tribal identities.
In a polity where SCs and STs command 25 percent reservations, , Christians’ exclusion from these quotas—rooted in the 1950 Presidential Order that ties benefits to Hinduism, Sikhism, or Buddhism— is a major blow to a political voice. In real terms, this means that Dalit Christians, perhaps as many as 60 % to 70 % percent of the community, languish as a politically disempowered people.
The issue is before the Supreme Court in several Public Interest Litigations, but its 2025 rulings—affirming denial in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu cases—seem to entrench despite “religion-neutral” quotas commended by the Chief Justice Ranganath Misra commission (2007) and Justice Rajender Sachar committee (2006). For about 90 lakh Christian tribals concentrated in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, and the Northeast, the peril is acute. Schedule Tribe status, granting 7.5 percent reservations and forest rights, faces delisting threats in central and northern states.
Rajasthan MP Kanhaiya Lal Rawat’s July 2025 call to strip converted tribals from the ST list echoed RSS demands, alleging “forced conversions” erode indigenous culture. This leads inevitably to violence, often physical. In Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, 2025 saw 86 and 95 incidents respectively of coercion, boycotts, and threats, as documented by the Religious Liberty Commission of the Evangelical Fellowship of India, a major non-denominational umbrella group.
Arunachal Pradesh’s revived the 1978 anti-conversion law in in 2025, targeting 30 % Christian tribals. Over 400 church leaders in a January 2025 appeal to Modi decried this as “discrimination undermining constitutional protections.” Electorally, challenges compound this disenfranchisement. Christians, dispersed and not a “vote bank” outside enclaves, evince apathy—turnout lags national averages, according to some recent studies. The BJP’s token outreach—fielding Mr Anil Antony, the son of senior Congress leader and former Defence Minister Mr. AK Anthony, in Kerala, appointing Mr. Kurian—cannot mask this political derision, or hostility.
The population arithmetic is also against the community in a political context. Christian fertility, at 1.9 children per woman (according to the NFHS-5, 2019-21 data and UN 2025 projections), mirrors national decline to 1.9, below replacement level of 2.1. The US agency Pew’s 2021 data shows Christian growth slowest at 15.7 %, stabilising at 2 percent by 2050. It may be due to the high education of Christian women, but it amplifies vulnerability—fewer numbers mean less clout.
Mr. Mohan Bhagwat’s November 8-9, 2025, Bengaluru address at the RSS centenary. “There is no A-Hindu in India,” he proclaimed, describing Muslims and Christians “forgotten” Hindu descendants, Bharat a “Hindu Rashtra”.
The Catholic Bishops Conference of India protested, saying “Christians are proud Indians but not Hindu.” The Bishops rejected this “misleading” Hindu Rashtra as a “nefarious attempt” to subvert secularism. The lack of legislative heft means unchecked anti-conversion laws - now in 12 states. – which together with the hate emboldens vigilante violence. The United Christian Forum recorded 834 attacks in 2024.
Future elections risk deepening this. The BJP’s Kerala inroads through. Syro-Malabar alliances notwithstanding, tokenism prevails. As does community despair.
(The author is a Sr. Journalist, Right activist, and spokesman of the All India Catholic Union. Views expressed this article are personal.)
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