CHRISTMAS BEEF

India Freezes Mother Teresa Charity’s Funds Amid Hindu Nationalist Attacks

The chief minister of West Bengal took to Twitter to condemn the government’s decision and its disruption to the charity’s humanitarian work.

The Indian government froze the bank accounts of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity (MoC), a prominent humanitarian group in the country, on Monday. Based out of West Bengal, the charity's 3,000 nuns support abandoned children, leper colonies, hospices, schools, and more globally. The decision comes amid accusations from the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that the MoC uses charity as a guise for religious conversion of poor Hindus and tribal groups, as well as a week of hate attacks instigated by right-wing Hindu groups who disrupted Christmas masses in several parts of India. In a Monday statement, the central government said that it had decided to reject a license renewal from the charity on Christmas day, citing only “adverse inputs” that it came across during review. Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of West Bengal, took to Twitter to condemn the government’s decision and its disruption to the charity’s humanitarian work, which supports 22,000 patients and employees.