Amidst noisy interruptions from Oppositions members -- mostly belonging to Left parties and some Christian members of Congress -- Shourie extensively quoted from Government documents and institutional literature of the missionaries to buttress his point of view. Shourie was speaking on a private members Bill tabled by Kamla Sinha of Janata Dal calling for concern on the rising cases of atrocities against minorities and particularly Christians.

As Shourie reeled off statistics and quotes from Government reports, several agitated members objected to his ``launching the debate on conversions'' in the House. Vyalar Ravi of Congress said Shourie was trying to ``justify atrocities on Christians''.

Shourie said a particular brand of mediapersons wereleading the disinformation campaign on the recent incidents involving attacks on members of the Christian community in the country. He said most of the incidents in Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, and Gujarat were either baseless or were factually distorted by media.

Shourie asked the Parliamentarians to face the facts and instead of converting each incident into an mutual mud-slinging match, they should analyse each incident and insist on follow-up actions.

He said Christian missionaries were indulging in conversions through allurements like money and social security benefits and had targeted India for a massive evangelisation plan. Shourie insisted that the conversion designs of missionaries were stoking communal tensions in the country.

Kamala Sinha said the incidents of attacks on Christians had besmirched the image of India as a tolerant nation in the eyes of the world. Accusing the Vishwa Hindu Parishad of raising a false alarm over the ``conversions,'' Sinha said despite the presence of missionaries inIndia for decades, the Christian population had not gone up significantly.

The debate generated enough heat as Opposition members raked up points of order at several occasions to stall Shourie's speech. At this juncture Home Minister L K Advani requested the Chair to permit Shourie to speak in view of the importance of the subject.

However, Shourie's speech remained inconclusive as the House was adjourned at 5 pm.