By Matters India Reporter
Kochi, July 7, 2020: The Kerala High Court July 7 rejected deposed Jalandhar Bishop Franco Mulakkal’s plea to quash the charge of sexually assaulting a nun against him and directed him to face trial.
The prosecution had argued in court that there’s ample evidence against the bishop in the case and that the prelate was simply trying to delay the proceedings. Both in the FIR as well as in the secret statement provided by the victim, there’s clear evidence of the bishop’s acts, it said.
On the other hand, the 56-year-old prelate, in his plea for discharge claimed that the charges against him were cooked up due to some personal grudges and differences the victim had with him. He claimed he was being implicated because he had questioned her financial dealings.
He had moved the high court after a trial court in Kottayam had dismissed his discharge plea in March.
Bishop Mulakkal of Jalandhar, a diocese in the northern Indian state of Punjab, is accused of raping a Missionaries of Jesus sister several times between 2014 and 2016 at a convent in Kuravilangad near Kottayam, the town where the trial court is situated.
The prelate had spent three weeks in prison in 2018 after being arrested by a special investigation team of the police and was released on bail.
His counsel said Bishop Mulakkal would move the Supreme Court soon.
In June, the trial court had asked him to appear before it on July 1, but he had played truant, citing that his house is Jalandhar is located in a coronavirus disease containment zone.
Sister Anupama, one of the five nuns, who had staged in a sit-in Kochi in September 2018 seeking the bishop’s arrest, said she is happy with high court order and stated that she has full faith in the judicial system of the country.
Bishop Mulakkal’s case has pitchforked the role of Save our Sister Forum, which is spearheading the campaign against the bishop and also as an organization that is fighting for reforms in the Syro-Malabar Church, the second-largest Eastern Catholic Church in the world.