Date:18/01/2004 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2004/01/18/stories/2004011804120800.htm

National

'Probe attacks on Catholic missions'

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, JAN. 17. The new president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India (CBCI), Telesphore Toppo, today differed with the Madhya Pradesh Government's contention that the violence in Jhabua on Friday was just a "law and order situation". He said there was a pattern in the attacks on Catholic missions in the area.

Extending his condolences to the family of the girl who was found dead in the premises of a Catholic school recently, Cardinal Toppo said it was too simplistic to see the incident, in which one person was killed and nine others injured, as a law and order problem only. The administration must investigate the reason for the violence directed against Catholic institutions in an almost "synchronised fashion", he said in his first interaction with the media after taking over as CBCI president earlier this month.

The CBCI felt that the locals were instigated to target the Catholic institutions. It was not a spontaneous reaction to the discovery of the body of the girl in the school premises, but orchestrated a couple of days later. A major cause of concern for the CBCI is the fact that its institutions in Jhabua have been in the line of fire for some years now. The district bordering Gujarat came into sharp focus in 1998 after a couple of nuns were gang-raped inside a convent.