The write up ‘NIA’s Naga Terror – Funding Probe Reveals Insidious Role Of Top Bureaucrats, Politicians And Church Elders’ by Jaideep Mazumdar that appeared in a news portal Swarajya.com has ‘stooped so low to drag the sanctity of the church in Nagaland’.
This was stated in a press communique issued by the Nagaland Baptist Church Council (NBCC).
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The NBCC press statement went on to state that the language used ‘is degrading and provocative’ which is very ‘unbecoming of a senior journalist’.
The statement further alleged that the comments against the church and the analysis of the present political scenario reveal ‘lack of knowledge about the political and social fabrics of the Nagas’.
The NBCC also said that the writing showed that the journalist ‘stood on a certain religio-politico platform to denigrate and malign the church’.
“Nagas have lived under the threat of guns and power to divide us for a very long time but we have withstood the test. Now this write up seems to have taken another path to pull us down and divide us further,” the NBCC statement said.
The statement further said that if the NIA move is to portray the church as collaborators of corruption and extortion, it is most unfortunate.
“The church will not allow itself to be a convenient toy of unsubstantiated accusation by those who do not have any respect for the church as a faith base institution,” it further stated.