Category: From The States

Church and political leaders in India have condemned the gang rape and murder of a Dalit woman in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
The 19-year-old died in national capital Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital on Sept. 29 after she was raped in Hathras on Sept. 14. She was taken to Safdarjung on Sept. 28 from Aligarh Muslim University Medical College.
“There are no words that can describe this inhuman and barbaric act. We condemn the heinous crime committed on the poor Dalit girl and destroying her family. It’s a very unfortunate and sad thing to happen in a democratic country where a crime was committed weeks ago but the administration is still in the dark,” Bishop Gerald John Mathias of Lucknow told.
“Crimes and atrocities against Dalits and the downtrodden are nothing new in this part of the country. You take any newspaper or scan a television channel you can read about their plight, the injustice done towards Dalits.
“The main reason behind the rape cases in the state is the mentality of the people here who think of women as objects and treat women as second-class citizens. Unless that mentality changes, we will hear about crimes like these every other day.” The bishop, who is based in the state capital of Uttar Pradesh, said people have no fear of the law and don’t hesitate to take the law into their hands, which is very dangerous for civil society.
According to media reports, four upper-caste men attacked the Dalit woman in Hathras. She suffered multiple fractures, paralysis and a deep gash on her tongue.
Based on the complaint filed by her parents, four men have been arrested and charged with gang rape and attempted murder.
Jesuit Father Cedric Prakash, a human rights activist, told that “the brutal gang rape and the subsequent murder of the Dalit woman in Hathras should make us all hang our heads in shame. This is a heinous crime which we condemn in no uncertain terms.”

In New Delhi, some 200 people gathered at downtown Jantar Mantar to observe the National Day of Solidarity for Father Stan Swamy.
Prominent human rights activists such as Shabanam Hashmi, Harsh Mander and Apoorvanand Jha addressed the gathering. According to them, the government has exposed itself by arresting a Jesuit priest who has worked for the rights of poor tribal communities for more than three decades.
India Matters India Medha Patkar of Narmada Bachao Andolan (save Narmada campaign), who joined the program through Zoom meeting, said her heart beats for Father Stan, who “worked for Atmanirbhar Adivasi” (self-reliant Tribal).
At Guwahati in Assam, the gateway to northeastern India, an ecumenical program was organized to show solidarity with Father Swamy. The participants demanded immediate release of the Jesuit priest all Intellectuals and activists who have been arrested for standing with the poor and the marginalized.
India_Matters India-Guwahati meeting Intellectuals, editors, politicians from the Northeast also had a virtual meeting that attracted over a hundred participants to express their solidarity with Father Swamy and other human rights activists who appear to be arbitrarily implicated by the law enforcement agencies, in what is being seen in liberal circles as an effort to intimidate those who speak up.
In Bengaluru, capital of the southern Indian State of Karnataka, large number of people cutting across religions, formed a 3-kilometer human chain against what they described as “the illegal treatment and arrest of Father Stan Swamy.”
In Kochi, Kerala, various Christian denominations on October 11 demanded the release of Father Swamy, who was arrested in what they called “in gross violation of human rights and democratic norms.”
In a statement, the Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council expressed shock at the arrest of the Jesuit priest.
In Patna, Bihar, many social and human rights organizations joined a protest rally to express solidarity with Father Swamy. Some hundred people waved posters and chanted for the release of the priest, who they said was legally ‘abdu-cted’ by the NIA on trumped up charges.

Bosco Youth of Bangalore Archdiocese has celebrated the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi (Gandhi Jayanti) by pledging a greener nature.
Around 41 Bosco youth and their animators on October 2 planted more than 1,000 saplings at Kishore Farm, Manchanahalli, Chikka-ballapur district about 60 km from Bengaluru city. It was part of a mega rural plantation drive organized by the Lions Club International, Region IV.
It was yet another opportunity for the members of Bosco Youth to pledge towards a greener nature, Fathers William D’Souza, the regional director of Bosco Youth, Karnataka, explained.
He said the youth group is guided by the motto “Together Towards a Better World.”

Caritas India, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India’s social wing, has bagged the award for the best non-govern-mental organization for health-care services during the Covid-19 outbreak.
Federal Health Minister Harsh Vardhan presented the award to Father Paul Moonjely, director of Caritas India, on Oct. 2 in a virtual ceremony organized by media group India Today.
“The institutional strength of the Church as a humanitarian collective helped us to team up and reach out to the last mile with the amazing support of the church leadership,” Father Moonjely said in his message after receiving the award.
“I dedicate this award to all our Covid warriors, health workers and volunteers in different parts of the country at community and institutional levels.”
The Healthgiri Awards 2020 acknowledged the invin-cible spirit of corona warriors who have led the battle against the pandemic. The awards are the reincarnated version of the Safaigiri Awards held annually on Gandhi Jayanti, the birth anniversary of the father of the nation.
This year’s event was held in the national capital to honor the pioneering efforts of corona warriors from all walks of life.
During the Covid-19 humanitarian response, Caritas India went the extra mile to show solidarity with and provide support for the vulnerable and marginalized sections of society.

St Pius X College, the major seminary of the Arch-diocese of Bombay, October 5 celebrated its sixty years of existence.
Cardinal Oswald Gracias, Archbishop of Bombay, celebrated the thanksgiving Mass at the seminary located at Goregaon West.
The seminary has been instrumental in training ‘Ambassadors for Christ’ for Western India and beyond, the cardinal said. He also thanked all associated with the establishment and growth of the seminary since 1960.
The cardinal prayed that the seminary continue to send forth messengers for Christ.
The seminary is named after Pope Pius X (1835–1914), who was known for vigorously opposing modernist interpretations of Catholic doctrine, promoting liturgical reforms and scholastic philosophy and theology.
Seminary training in Bombay Archdiocese had many beginnings starting as early as 1770.

Catholics and Jesuits in the eastern Indian State of Jharkhand are mourning a Belgian priest who worked tirelessly to educate tribal people and the downtrodden.
Father Louis Francken died on Oct. 5 in Constant Lievens Hospital and Research Centre in Mandar, a suburb of Ranchi, the state capital. He was 82 and died of age-related illnesses.
“His first love was education and until the end he was dedicated to his work educating tribal people and the downtrodden so that they can become self-dependent and improve their socioeconomic conditions in society,” Father Ajay Soreng, secretary to the Ranchi Jesuit provincial, told.

St Xavier’s College of Management and Techno-logy in Patna October 6 conferred the Xavier Pride of Bihar Award 2020 on Saikat Guha, the new director of Centre for Quantum Networks under the University of Arizona in the United States.
The award was presented during an online interactive session the Patna-born scientist had with the students of the Jesuit college. Guha was appointed the director of CQN in August this year. His team has been given the task of developing the internet of the future, ruled by quantum mechanical pro-perties.

The publication of a rape accused bishop’s picture with Pope Francis in a feast day greeting has upset a group of Catholic women in India.
A press release issued by Sisters in Solidarity on October 6 says its members “are perturbed to see a greeting that is being circulated on the occasion of the feast of St Francis of Assisi where the picture of Bishop Franco Mulakkal is put alongside with Pope Francis.”

There is a mixed bag in governance in India these days. On one hand, Muslims are demonized, Christians’ charity and philanthropic works are linked to the forced conversion debate and quite often sedition laws or the controversial Armed Forces Special Power Act (AFSPA) are used to silence dissent.
Then there is the latent anguish of the middle class and poor. There is also an agrarian crisis. In any other political set-up, opposition parties could have gone in for the kill and cornered India’s ruling dispensation under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But often the misguided moves by opposition parties like “creating pandemonium” in parliament come to the rescue of Modi’s publicity wing. The goalposts are changed and the battle which should have been to expose fault lines in the new farm bills goes into another realm.
Steered by an ostensibly decisive and determined Prime Minister, the Indian government is in serious confabulation with the Chinese leadership these days. But there could be a brief lesson for Modi’s leadership to learn from the Chinese context. The reasons could be multiple but how long can Modi brave through the situation with the argument that the Prime Minister of the world’s largest democracy cannot be solely blamed for all the ills and limitations?
“It is appalling that human rights defenders are locked up in overcrowded prisons and continuously denied bail despite calls by the UN to decongest prisons and release political prisoners during the pandemic,” says Josef Benedict, CIVICUS Asia-Pacific civic space researcher.
As many as 332 people were reportedly arrested under the sedition law between 2016 and 2018, though the conviction rates were very poor. Mob lynchings were carried out between 2014 and 2019 in various parts of India and in many instances it has been suggested that there is now perhaps a type of institutionalization of the communal venom.

Several Catholic groups in India have expressed relief after the Vatican removed its controversial envoy from the country.
Pope Francis on August 29 suddenly transferred Archbishop Giambattista Diquattro, apostolic nuncio to India and Nepal, to Brazil amid accusations of inaction against allegedly corrupt bishops.
“I saw the nuncio’s transfer as a small moral victory, not something to gloat about, but more a sense of relief,” chhotebhai, coordinator of the Indian Catholic Forum and former president of the All India Catholic Union, the largest lay association in the country, told NCR.
Chhotebhai says he had taken up with the nuncio issues such as the controversy around then-Bishop Gallela Prasad of Cuddapah, in the southern Indian State of Andhra Pradesh. Prasad faced a criminal complaint for allegedly misappropriating diocesan funds to lead a luxurious life with his alleged wife and son.
Another request to the nuncio was to act against Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jalandhar, who has been accused of raping a nun multiple times.
However, the Vatican later removed Prasad from his post, and accepted Mulakkal’s request for temporary resignation to face the court case. The apostolic nunciature in New Delhi did not respond to request for comment for this story, or on the accusations made against Diquattro during his tenure in India. The Holy See press office also did not respond to a request for comment. Vikram K. Antony, a Catholic politician in Bengaluru, says he had written to the nuncio about the arrest of a few priests in the murder of a seminary rector. “There was no action or inquiry into our complaints,” he told NCR.
Another person happy with the nuncio’s transfer is Kochurani Abraham, a feminist theologian who accompanies the rape survivor nun and her supporters.
Sr Anupama Kelama-ngalathuveli, the spokes-person for the survivor and her supporters, corrobora-ted Abraham’s narration of the developments. She, however, declined to talk further as the trial in the case began on August 13.
Saldanha, who has headed women’s offices under bishops’ conferences in Asia and India, dismisses Diquattro’s tenure in India as insignificant.
John Dayal, current spokesperson of the All India Catholic Union, says people complained against Diquattro because of their ignorance about a nuncio’s role.
A nuncio, according to Dayal, is “not a monitor, or a policeman and magistrate, to admonish, administer instant justice or mete out punishment.” Every bishop, he explains, is sovereign in his diocese and answerable only to the Pope.