Pope Francis on March 25 appointed a new archbishop in Manila Archdiocese, in the Philippine capital. He transferred Cardinal Jose Fuerte Advincula of Capiz to succeed Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, who the Pope had appointed Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples in the Vatican on December 8, 2019. The See of Manila has been vacant for more than 15 months during which Auxiliary Bishop Broderick Pabillo has been serving as Apostolic Administrator.
Nuns accused of conversion, forced to get off train in Jhansi
Two nuns and two trainees travelling along with them on a train were forced to deboard in Uttar Pradesh’s Jhansi railway station and detained briefly for questioning, after ABVP members accused them of illegal conversions.
The four were allowed to resume their journey after an enquiry by railway officials found there was no conversion involved.
The incident happened on March 19. On Wednesday, amid an outrage over the incident, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan wrote to Union Home Minister Amit Shah that the harassment of the two nuns and two postulants was “shocking.”
Mr. Vijayan demanded that Mr. Shah instruct the authorities concerned to take strict action against “all groups and indi-viduals who disrupt and impair the freedom of individual rights.”
Naeem Khan Mansuri, SP Railway Jhansi, said that the ABVP members were travelling back from a training camp in Rishikesh. The four Christian women were travelling from Nizamuddin in Delhi to Rourkela in Odisha.
Government Railway Police (GRP) Jhansi said that their control room received infor-mation on March 19 that some women were being taken on the Utkal Express train for religious conversion. On the basis of this information, the RPF asked them to deboard, and upon investigation by the GRP it turned out that the allegations were false, GRP Jhansi said on Twitter.
Videos from the day showed police and other unidentified persons questioning the nuns and scanning through their Aadhaar cards while they were seated on their berths. The four then get off the train and could be seen heading towards what appeared to be a police station.
The GRP found that the two girls from Odisha were undergoing training in Delhi. The police found baptism certificates of 2003 in their possession.
“This proved that they were Christian by birth. They were not going to be converted,” said Mr. Mansuri.
Indian bishops’ study reveals grim life of tribal migrant workers
A new study sponsored by Catholic bishops in India has revealed the grim reality for most tribal migrant workers in the capital New Delhi where they suffer from endemic poverty and low wages amid an absence of workplace safety and socio-economic security.
The study, ‘Tribal Migrants in Delhi City: A Pre Covid and Post Covid Analysis,’ a joint venture by the Conference of Catholic Bishops’ of India (CCBI) Commission for Migrants and Workers India Federation, was released earlier this month.
Led by noted researcher Lata Jayaraj, the survey covers the migrants who belong to the tribal communities from neighboring states to Delhi. It analyzes the push and pull factors and the socio-economic compulsions of the migrants in pre-Covid and post-Covid situations.
“The study was an attempt to look into various factors behind migration, the various problems these tribal migrant workers face, and to analyze support system government agencies and NGOs have for them,” said Father Jaison Vadassery, secretary of the CCBI’s Commission for Migrants.
The priest noted that the study recommends a multi-pronged strategy from the government and non-government agencies to assist poor, vulnerable migrant workers effectively to overcome their miserable conditions.
The study used an in-depth analysis covering tribal migrant workers in the construction sector of Delhi. It reached out to 45 respondents, male and female, as samples who provided necessary information through case studies, focus group discussions and participant observations.
About 91% of tribal migrant workers in the construction sector are below 50 years, while only 8.8% are above 50. The sector is largely male-dominant, men accounting for 93.3%. The majority of them are Hindus.
Some 51% of workers migrated from Rajasthan, 16% from West Bengal, and 9% each from Assam, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh.
The study found a direct link between their low level of education, poverty, migration and low-paid employment.
Nine arrested over mob lynching in eastern India
Police in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand have arrested nine people in connection with the mob lynching of a 26-year-old Muslim man on the outskirts of Ranchi. According to media reports, this was the second such incident in the state capital in one week. Earlier, a 22-year-old man was beaten in the Upper Bazar area on suspicion of theft and later died.
“No religion or society in this world can accept such a heinous crime. We appeal to the government to make a law to check these inhuman acts,” Ratan Tirkey, a member of the tribal advisory committee of the Jharkhand government, told.
“For the past two to three years, we have been hearing the barbaric news of mob lynchings in the state. It is condemnable and unacceptable because for centuries people here have been living in harmony and brotherhood.
“The state is mostly comprised of tribal people who are by nature a peace-loving people and who have a good rapport with other faiths. We had no such problem in the past, so it is a matter of great concern and it has to be dealt with quickly.”
Faithful will question pastoral letter’s sanctity: Vijayan
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has flayed a pastoral letter read in some churches of the Quilon diocese against the southern Indian state’s Left Democratic Front government.
The sanctity of the pastoral letters will be questioned by devotees, the chief minister said March 26. They (a section of church leadership) are attacking the government just like the opposition, he said. The allegations raised by them are not their own, Pinarayi said.
The Latin diocese on March 21 targeted the Kerala and the federal governments, claiming there was an “organized effort” to destroy the fishing sector and sell it to corporates.
State Fisheries Minister J Mercykutty Amma accused the Church of speaking for the opposition Congress-led United Democratic Front.
Kerala will go to polls on April 6 to elect its 140-member legislative assembly and the major contenders are LDF and UDF. The pastoral letter, targe-ting the LDF government, said “the controversial agreement with a foreign company, EMCC, was withdrawn following wide-spread opposition.”
The fishing community should also be aware of “Blue Economy” project, a move by the central government giving permission for mining for resources from the sea, it said.
Bajrang Dal denies role in Kerala nuns’ harassment
The Bajrang Dal has denied involvement in a controversial March 19 incident where two nuns and two students were forced alight from a train in Jhansi over an alleged forced conversion complaint and questioned by railway police.
According to reports, Bajrang Dal activists and police questioned the nuns, who are members of the Sacred Heart congregation under the Kerala-based Syro-Malabar Church.
The alleged Hindu radicals accused the nuns of taking the two women for forcible conversion.
Railway police later said the complaint against the nuns was found to be without basis, and the women were allowed to board another train to their destination in Odisha.
The Bajrang Dal statement came March 24 hours after Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan alleged in a letter to federal Home Minister Amit Shah that the four nuns were “harassed” by Bajrang Dal members during their train journey.
“Bajrang Dal has nothing to do with this incident. Due to the anti-Hindu mindset the Church lobby sees Bajrang Dal in every incident,” said Bajrang Dal national convener Sohan Singh.
“It is the church lobby that is behind this. If you look at the FIR or the complaint, there is no mention of Bajrang Dal. It is an eight-day-old case but soon after we got to know about it, we en-quired from our Jhansi team and they denied any involvement,” he added.
Eight Indian Christians hospitalized after attack by Hindu mob
Eight Christians were injured and hospitalized when Hindu radicals attacked them and accused them of religious conversion in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh.
More than 150 Christians were praying in a house church on March 8 in Dantewada district when the Hindus attacked them with axes, stones and wooden clubs, injuring several of them, local media reported.
“We heard on March 9 about the attack on Christians who belong to the Pentecostal church in Dantewada district. As of now the police have not filed a first information report because most of the time they try to solve the problem amicably,” Bishop Joseph Kollamparampil of Jagdalpur told.
“This is a communally sensitive area, so the administration tries to handle the situation carefully and avoid creating any communal tension in the area.
“There are several reasons Christians are attacked in that particular area and one of the main reasons is both the parties try to provoke each other. Both Christians and Hindus should respect each other to avoid the unnecessary situation.
“There are more than 70 denomination churches in the area and we have no control over them. We have a united Christian forum, a platform where all Christian leaders come and share their views and discuss things, and I hope this will help us clear our differences.”
Experts express concern over India’s downgrading in freedom rating
Experts have expressed serious concerns over the downgrading of India’s status from ‘the world’s largest democracy to an ‘electoral autocracy’ and from a “Free Country” to a “Partly Free Country” in the international reports.
They expressed their views in a group discussion held by Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH) here on the topic of the impact of the upcoming Assembly Elections in five states and the responsibilities of voters.
Initiating the discussion on the topic, JIH Secretary Malik Motasim Khan has said that elections are very important to a democracy. “Through the elections, people can show their power by choosing their favourite representatives and rejecting the undesirable ones. The people use their voting power to correct their past mistakes and throw out incompetent representatives and this is a great opportunity for them,” he added. Pointing out that elections are now using as a tool to divide the people rather than unite them, the JIH Secretary talked about the present atmosphere where sedition charges are being slapped on trivial matters, students and journalists are being put behind bars, people are facing troubles only for speaking out on the issues and even questions are being raised on the judiciary.
Malik Motasim said, “the atmosphere created by some political parties in recent years, seems that attempts are being made to disintegrate the people and the country under the guise of elections. This is very harmful to our country. Therefore, recent international reports have branded India as partly free which is heading toward the democratic autocracy.” He was referring to the annual report of Sweden’s V-Dem Institute, which has downgraded India from ‘the world’s largest democracy to an ‘electoral autocracy’ while just days before the US watchdog Freedom House’s report graded it from a “Free Country” to a “Partly Free Country”.
Expressing serious concerns over the international reports related to India, senior journalist Prashant Tandon said, “we can neither deny them nor call them biased reports as the gravity of the situation of the country is obvious. Democracy is an institution that runs based on public opinion. Raising issues before voting is very important in forming a government. Instead of voting on the issues like education, health, cleanliness, employment, human rights, development and industry, we vote in the name of religion and caste. Now the politics of polarization has emerged based on hatred for some years. This is not good for a democratic country. In such a situation, this is the prime responsibility of the citizens to be alert while voting, keeping in view the interest and development of the country and elect only honest representatives.”
UN selects Indian Catholic to represent Asia’s indigenous languages
United Nations has nominated a Catholic activist and educationist from the eastern Indian Jharkhand state as the indigenous languages’ representative for Asia.
Anabel Benjamin Bara was selected on March 19 from Asia by UNESCO for the Global Task Force of International Decades of Indigenous Languages (IDIL) 2022-2032.
The appointment letter signed by Xing Qu, UN Deputy Director-General for Communication and Information, said “members were nominated by the respective electoral groups of UNESCO’s member states, indigenous peoples and indigenous peoples’ organizations from each socio-cultural region.”
Denial of bail to Stan Swamy evokes criticism, anguish
The denial of bail to Father Stan Swamy continues to evoke condem-nation even as the court claimed it has found evidence to prove the 83-year-old Jesuit tribal activist had conspired to overthrow the government.
Special judge D E Kothalikar of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) court rejected Father Swamy’s bail plea on March 22 but his order was made available a day later.
The order says the bail was refused based on the material on record that indicated Father Swamy was a member of the banned Maoist organization that had hatched a “serious conspiracy” to create unrest in the country and to overthrow the government.