Indian official: Tribal conversion bid 'bigger crime' than trespassing
- Khushboo Razdan
- Dec 23, 2021
- 1 min read
Published on 09-Dec-2018
Khushboo Razdan
Three weeks after a young American was reportedly killed by a 60,000-year-old protected tribe for trespassing into their territory, the chief of India's top body for tribal affairs has told CGTN that the "bigger crime" was the apparent attempt at religious conversion.
John Allen Chau, a 27-year-old U.S. national, had been seeking to make contact with the tribe in India's Andaman Islands.
"A diary left behind by Chau for his friends and family suggests that he was pursuing a planned trip to influence the tribe into accepting Christianity," said Nand Kumar Sai, chairman of India's National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST), in an exclusive interview with CGTN Digital.
"All the evidence that the investigative agencies have gathered so far indicate that he was trying to convert them; it's unethical and ignorant," Sai said, adding that the investigation is not yet complete.
John Allen Chau /Photo via his Instagram account
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