By Matters India Reporter Panaji: Jesuit provincial of Goa Father Roland Coelho on December 3 urged Catholics to stand with the poor and the voiceless. He was speaking at the Mass on the feast of St Francis Xavier at Bom Jesu Basilica, Old Goa. The Catholic Church observes December 3Continue Reading
In Jaipur one afternoon last fall, the filmmaker Anand Patwardhan sat in a booth outside an auditorium, waiting to screen his latest documentary, “Reason.” These showings, Patwardhan had written to me earlier, were “semi-clandestine” — partly out of a fear of right-wing vigilante groups and partly because, even now, twoContinue Reading
Guwahati: Assam is planning a law that will require the bride and groom to declare their religion and income in official documents a month before the wedding. Against the backdrop of many other BJP-ruled states bringing in laws to check “love jihad”, the Assam government says its aim is toContinue Reading
Panaji: Amid vociferous protests from the opposition as well as heritage conservationists, the Goa government has backpedalled from its proposed move to include an area housing a 17th century Old Goa Church complex under an urban planning authority. Critics of the move to include Ela village near Panaji, which isContinue Reading
New Delhi, India – India has made “impressive gains” in its fight against malaria, as the number of cases and deaths caused by the mosquito-borne disease has seen a marked drop in the country, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The number of malaria cases in India has dropped from nearly 20 millionContinue Reading
By Joanna Slater New Delhi: Marrying across religious lines has always been a challenge in India, a vast multifaith democracy where the pull of family and tradition remains strong. Now politicians in India’s ruling party are contemplating laws to thwart such unions, driven by a conspiracy theory that views themContinue Reading
Mumbai: After almost a nine-month hiatus, churches across the Archdiocese of Bombay celebrated the Holy Eucharist on Nov. 29 Last week, Cardinal Oswald Gracias had issued a circular informing the laity about the decision to start celebrating Mass from November 29 onwards. The first day turned out to be aContinue Reading
By Balakrishna Ganeshan Visakhapatnam: V S Krishna, a human rights activist, has been fighting for 11 Adivasi women, who were allegedly raped by the Greyhounds, the elite anti-Naxal police force in Andhra Pradesh, at gun-point. After more than a decade since the incident, the state police have booked Krishna underContinue Reading
By Nirmala Carvalho Mumbai: The Bombay archdiocese has mourned the death of Monsignor Nereus Rodrigues, a pioneer of education in the western Indian city of Mumbai. The monsignor spent more than 60 years in the archdiocese’s education apostolate and founded St Andrew’s College in Bandra. He was 97. During hisContinue Reading
Panaji: Describing the newly-minted Goa Tourism Policy 2020 as a “mirage” which will not benefit either the state or its people, a church body has said that the document is not only short on data and fact, but also bats for privatisation of public resources. In a letter to theContinue Reading