India is the 12th hardest country to be a Christian. The numbers explain why.

Every year, Open Doors publishes the World Watch List, which ranks the 50 countries where it is hardest to live as a Christian. In the 2026 edition, India is 12th, with 84 points out of 100. It dropped one place from 2025, but its score did not change — and Open Doors itself warns that rankings are relative: a country can “drop” because conditions worsened elsewhere, not because they improved there.

What weighs on India's score

The list measures pressure in five areas of life — private, family, community, national and church — plus physical violence. In India's case, the highest score is in national life: 15.1 out of a possible 16.7. That is where the anti-conversion laws of 13 states come in, along with restrictions on foreign donations under the FCRA and political rhetoric that treats Christianity as a foreign religion.

From October 2024 to September 2025, Open Doors counted in India 1,622 Christians arrested, detained without trial or sentenced — about a third of all cases worldwide — 82 churches or Christian buildings attacked or closed, and 16 Christians killed for their faith.

A curve that only rises

The United Christian Forum, which runs a free helpline for Christians at risk, records incidents year by year: 127 in 2014, 486 in 2021, 601 in 2022, 734 in 2023 and 834 in 2024. For 2025, the Religious Liberty Commission of the Evangelical Fellowship of India counted at least 920 — the highest since it began recording. The states with the most cases were Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.

How persecution happens

• In the neighborhood: groups break up house-church services, accuse the pastor of “forced conversion” and call the police — as in the two services attacked on the same Sunday in West Bengal.
• At the police station and in court: an accusation, even without evidence, leads to immediate arrest in states with anti-conversion laws — and can end in conviction, like that of seven Christians in Madhya Pradesh.
• In the community: economic boycott, water and power cut off, refusal to bury the dead in the village cemetery. In Chhattisgarh, a family that refused reconversion had its roof torn down and its water and power cut off.
• In institutions: audits of church properties, cancelled donation licences and inspections of schools, such as those hitting Serampore College.

Where pressure is lower

Reality varies greatly within the country. In the Christian-majority states of the Northeast — Nagaland, Mizoram and Meghalaya — church life is public and open. According to Open Doors, outside two or three of these states, even being seen praying can put any Christian at risk, not only new converts. See in How many Christians are there in India how the Christian population is distributed across the country.

Why this matters for those who pray

Behind each number there is a small church, almost always in a village, led by a pastor who never had formal theological training. That leader is the one who faces the accusation, the police station and the neighborhood pressure — and it is to him that the training this project translates into Bengali, Odia and Hindi is addressed.