Pastor Rakesh Babu was about to go to bed one night earlier this year in northern India when eight Hindu extremists broke into his house, beat and choked him and slit his wife’s throat, he said.
The eight assailants, including two women, who had accused him of luring people to convert to Christianity, intruded into the 51-year-old pastor’s home in Uttar Pradesh state’s Vyaspur village, Chandauli District after he had said his night prayers at about 10:15 on Jan. 14. After throwing him to the floor and beating him and his brother, 30, with wooden sticks, one of them began to choke him while the others shouted to kill him, he said.
“I did not see if they were carrying a knife, but the object used for slitting my wife’s throat was done with a sharp object, and from the deep wound, it appears to be a knife,” Pastor Babu told Morning Star News. “The moment they slit my wife’s throat with the sharp object, she fell down unconscious.”
His brother, Anand Babu, lives in a separate house but with a common kitchen, and he was bringing the pastor warm drinking water when the Hindu extremists attacked, he said. Bleeding, Pastor Babu managed to escape and ran into wet farmland, and when he fell, the assailants came and struck him with wooden sticks.
Pastor Babu’s son happened to be at Anand Babu’s house at the time.
“My son came and wept before the assailants – he pleaded with them to not hit me,” he said. “While he was pleading, I got an opportunity to escape, and I hid myself in a Christian home.”
The assailants intended to kill him, he said.
As villagers gathered at the commotion, the assailants left after loudly threatening him, telling him to stop leading church services, he said.