By Matters India Reporter

Mumbai: Parishioners of one of Mumbai’s oldest churches have protested the installation of a camera inside its women’s washroom.

“Why are our priests of St Michael’s parish being more ridiculous by the day? Just what are they expecting to capture on cameras? Women with their pants down or their sarees up? Are they missing out on something?” asks Karen C D’Souza, vice-president of Association of Concerned Catholics, in a letter addressed to Cardinal Oswald Gracias, archbishop of Bombay.

The CCTV camera was found in the women’s washroom of St Michael’s Church in Mahim.

The letter says the women parishioners would stop visiting the church if the camera is not removed from the washroom.

The letter urges the cardinal to ask his priests to become sensitive to women. “We don’t want men crowding around hoping to see some live porn,” the letter asserts.

It also asks the church to close the washroom as women cannot use it with a camera pointed at them.

The church, built by the Portuguese in 1534, said the camera was installed for female parishioners’ safety and to prevent thefts. The parish authorities have offered to remove the device if it made women uncomfortable.

The news about the camera appeared on September 5 in Mumbai Mirror newspaper. The same day the archdiocese issued a clarification terming the news as “misleading article.” It noted that the parish had installed the camera in 2014 at the behest of women parishioners, who complained about missing bags kept near the washroom’s entrance.

The archdiocesan press note also said the parish priest or his team had not received a single complaint until now.

The archdiocese also circulated a video recording of the camera’s exact position in the washroom. The camera, it added, faced outside and claimed there was no mala fide intention on the part of the parish team, who installed camera in good faith. “Hence, we are surprised to find this article in the Mumbai Mirror. So judge for yourselves,” it concluded.

D’Souza’s says that if the parish was worried about theft of its bathroom fittings, it should deploy security guards within 50 meters of the washroom.

The Mirror quoted Becky D’Souza, who visits the church regularly, as saying she found the decision to fix a camera baffling. “It’s fine to have cameras in the corridor. It’s a terrible feeling to know someone is watching you constantly while you are inside the washroom,” she said. “We don’t know the intention behind it, but it is wrong. It is an infringement of privacy,” she asserted.

Lyn Fernandes of Andheri stops by the church every day before heading to her Lower Parel office. She was among the first to protest the washroom surveillance. “We feel insecure. We don’t know who is monitoring the camera,” she said.

Advocate Joseph Sodder, who has also raised the issue with the archdiocese, said the installation amounted to outraging the modesty of women. “The footage is reviewed by men. We intend to lodge a complaint against the church and seizure of the footage,” he said.

Parish priest Father Simon Borges told Mirror that they would remove the camera if it caused misunderstanding and made women uncomfortable.