NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Thursday preferred to ask the Union Home Ministry Affairs to seek verification reports from Bihar, Haryana, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh on allegations of attacks on the Christian community.
"We can't form an opinion on the veracity of allegations made. It would be better to verify," a bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and Hima Kohli said, while giving two months to the MHA to conduct the entire exercise, including registration of FIRs, arrests made, status of investigation, and the charge sheets filed.
Senior advocate Colin Gonsalves, representing the petitioner, contended that 700 prayer meetings of Christians were stopped and violence was used against them.
Appearing for the Centre, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta along with Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati said on verification, the MHA found that many incidents referred to as communal attacks, were either false or exaggerated.
They also claimed that there was no merit in the plea alleging increasing attacks on Christians in the country.
Earlier, last month, the Union government has told the apex court that the PIL alleging increase on attack on Christians was based on "falsehood" and "half-baked self-serving articles, documents and press reports, intended to create unrest throughout the country and perhaps seek funds from abroad".
Rev Dr Peter Machado of National Solidarity Forum, Rev Vijayesh Lal of Evangelical Fellowship of India and others, have filed the PIL in the top court seeking directions to stop the alleged violence against the members of Christian community in the country. They also sought a direction for implementation of the directions issued in the Tehseen Poonawalla judgement (2018).
