Raipur: The molestation of a Catholic nun in a central Indian city on Saturday has hit international headlines.
What happened to the 47-year-old in a health center is still not clear as the victim is under severe trauma.
Fr Sebastian Poomattam, vicar general of Raipur archdiocese, tries to narrate the incident piecing together various details from different sources.
The archdiocese is based at the Raipur city, capital of Chhattisgarh state.
Fr Poomattam’s account:
In Asha Niketan (abode of hope) Complex has a health center known as “Khrist Sahay Kendre” (Christ help center), which has been serving the poor and middle class people of the locality for almost 60 years.
For people it is known as” Pila Makan” (yellow building). The health center now receives more outdoor patients than in-patients. Some days they do admit patients, and on other days it remains empty.
On the fateful night of the incident, the health center had no in-patients. Only the duty sister and two girl helpers stayed at there.
At 10 pm, the sister on duty told the girls to close the doors and go to bed. It is not known when the sister went to bed but the information so far we have is that Sr. Superior of the convent, which is next to the health center building, made phone call to the sister to ask her to send one of the girls.
Since the phone was not answered the superior came to the health center to find out the reason. She found the doors open and entered the duty sister’s room. She was surprised to find the victim tied to a cot. Both her hands were tied to rails of the cot behind the head and one sari was used to tie her waist to the cot. She was also gagged with cloth. The room was vandalized and things were thrown all around including some money on the ground.
The superior informed the provincial and other members of her congregation. Sr. Provincial informed the diocesan authorities who advised her to call the police. Police arrived and made preliminary enquiries and then asked the sisters to untie her.
Health center doctor was called as instructed by the police. The doctor seeing the victim expressed her shock and after examination told the police that she feared that a serious crime had taken place.
Police informed their higher authorities who also arrived at the spot. The victim was taken to the Ambedkar Medical College Hospital. When the victim came to her sense she told the police that two people entered her room at night and raped her. The victim is still not in her normal senses. Police has filed an FIR (First Information Report) and launched the probe to catch the culprits.
The two helper girls were sleeping in another room and did not know what happened at night. When questioned they said that when they awoke in the morning they found the door open. They thought that sister might have opened the door so they went and looked in the room. Usually the sister sleeps on a mat in the room on the floor and she was not there. So they presumed the sister might have gone out and left the door open.
The Christian community has condemned the event and staged a candle lit protest in the city center on June 20 evening and took out a protest rally the next day. They also submitted a memorandum to the Governor and the Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh as well as concerned authorities. We hope the perpetrators of the crime will be arrested soon and justice will be done.