Over two dozen Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad activists barged into a Christian prayer meeting in an Agra hotel on Tuesday and attacked the preachers with hockey sticks, alleging they were converting people and bad-mouthing Hinduism, police sources said.

Officers and some of the preachers confirmed that the attackers abused two women missionaries and thrashed their five male counterparts, ripping their clothes.

The missionaries were then handed over to police, who registered a case against them on the charge of luring poor Hindus into Christianity by promising better food and health services and better education for their children.

An officer in Agra said the police did not find anything objectionable about the prayer meeting but registered the case on the instructions of a senior BJP leader in Agra.

A police officer in Lucknow said that no case had been registered against the alleged attackers because the Christians “were not ready to file any complaint”. He said three of the preachers were from Kerala.

Circle officer Udai Raj Singh told reporters the case had been registered on a complaint from Bajrang Dal activist Sani Banswar “but we need time to probe the case”.

Banswar told reporters he had been at the meeting and heard the missionaries use foul language against Hinduism and ask people to adopt Christianity. He said he then called other Dal and VHP leaders.

Sunil Parashar, VHP zonal vice-president, said his organisation had known about the prayer meeting beforehand and “sent our members there”.

“They told us the missionaries promised gifts to Dalits but asked them to convert to Christianity first,” he said.

“We immediately asked our members to go to the venue and prevent the missionaries from persuading the Hindus present to accept their religion.”

Father Moon Lazarus, spokesperson for the Agra Christian Mahasangh, said: “There is no restriction on meetings anywhere in the country. A proper inquiry should be done before blaming anybody for anything.”

Anu Jackson, one of the missionaries, told reporters a musical programme was going on after the prayer when the attackers barged in.

“They first damaged a guitar and badly thrashed the young man playing it. Then they started beating all of us. They were not ready to listen to us,” Jackson said.