Indian Muslims: Who Are They c9.s5.2

c9.s5.2

It is exceedingly interesting to note that the agencies of conversion to the Semetic religions, Islam and Christianity, were, the same - inter-communal marriages, force and enslavement, and missionary endeavour. Portuguese missionary activity was well organised and quite effective. In Goa, Albuquerque encouraged his soldiers to marry in the families of Turkish officers.³⁹ To promote mixed marriages, Portuguese with Indian wives as well as neoconverts, were treated as a privileged class for appointment to petty offices.⁴⁰ Force was also openly used for obtaining converts.⁴¹ In 1560, the year the Inquisition was set up, 13,092 Hindus were forcibly converted. In 1578, the missionaries pulled down 350 temples and converted 100,000 people.⁴² Similar, and in some cases worse, treatment was meted out to Muhammadans. Consequently by 1583 Goa had by and large become Christian, while Salsette had a Christian population of 8,000. After Goa, Cochin was the next Mission Centre. By 1570 there were more than twenty-five Christian stations in Travancore and about 15,000 converts. In 1600 Mission Centres in Travancore had risen to fifty. Converts on the Fishery Coast alone are estimated from 90,000 to 130,000.⁴³ Christian Missions made successful efforts in converting low caste people. Appreciative of the attitude of the Indian people, Henrique advised Loyola: It is better in India to baptize all those of one caste than different individuals taken from various castes.⁴⁴