Media Release
Bangalore, Jul 3: There are a large number of Konkani speaking people in Bangalore, who along with Federation of Konkani Catholic Association (FKCA) have been demanding Konkani in liturgy in Bangalore Archdiocese since many years.
It is already known that all powerful Senate body of the Archdiocese meeting in Bangalore on July 17 for a final solution to the vexed language row over the liturgical celebrations in the Bangalore Archdiocese, which has been defying solutions for almost four decades.
Hence to implement Konkani in Liturgy, in preparation for July 17 meeting by the Archdiocese, FKCA, Bangalore is going one step ahead to recognize all Konkani speaking people and families in Bangalore through this small survey to calculate the majority of Konkani speaking families in Bangalore.
CLICK HERE or visit www.fkca.net to take part in this survey.
If your mother tongue is Konkani and you are a resident of Bangalore please fill this form. Anyone from coastal Karnataka, Goa or any part of the world but presently residing in Bangalore and whose mother tongue is Konkani can fill this form.
Some facts
Allowing space for Konkani in the liturgy and Holy Eucharistic celebrations in the Archdiocese of Bangalore and other dioceses in Karnataka like Chikmagalur, Mysore, Shimoga etc, which has predominant Konkani speaking faithful is the long pending demand of Konkani Catholics and FKCA in Archdiocese.
Regarding this there were many meetings and discussions held in the past also written representation from the three delegations has been given to the panel headed by the highly respected Archbishop Menaparampil, comprising Dr Agnelo, Bishop of Mumbai and Dr Thomas Dabre, Bishop of Pune, which has been constituted by the Apostolic Nuncio to India, Archbishop Salvatore Pennacchio, on his four day visit to Bangalore in the month of July 2012.The grievances of Konkani speaking Catholics in Bangalore were taken up under the banner of the Federation of Konkani Catholic Associations, which has as many as 16 associations of Konkani Catholics in different parts of Bangalore alone and another 11 associations of Konkani Catholics in other districts of Karnataka and several foreign countries in the Middle East, US, UK and Canada.
The FKCA team led by its chairperson Aida D’Cunha and past chairmen Valerian Fernandes and Charles Gomes along with the office-bearers it also took up the case of Konkani Catholics of Chikmagalur, Mysore, Shimoga dioceses along with the represents of (Konkani Prachar Sanchalan President Ronlad (Roy) Castelino and Eric Ozario, Gurkar of Mandd Sobhann, Chikmagalur district’s Catholic Konkani Rakan Sanchalan Secretary Edward Pinto, Mysore’s Konkani Christian Association secretary John William D’Souza.
In July 2012, speaking to the Apostolic Nunico’s three-member team on behalf of FKCA, Gabriel Vaz, journalist, made it clear that Karnataka accounted for the largest number of Konkani speaking people and the state had more than half the nearly 30 lac Konkani speaking people spread among different castes and religions like Roman Catholics, Christians belonging to Protestants and other denominations, Hindus, Gowd Saraswat Brahmins, Navayats or Muslims, Kudumbis and even Siddis of African origin.
While Konkani speaking people were predominant in Mangalore and the newly created Udupi dioceses as well Karwar and Chikmagalur dioceses, Mysore, Shimoga, Bangalore and even Belgaum dioceses had substantial numbers of Konkani Catholics. However, Konkani was used in the Liturgy and Eucharistic celebrations in Mangalore, Udupi and Karwar dioceses, all other dioceses had denied any space for Konkani while according primacy to the state’s official language of Kannada.
'Discard 3-language formula; allow other languages'
''Though we are Konkani speaking and love our mother-tongue very much, we have no problems in using Kannada in our day-to-day life. However, we feel happy to use our mother tongue in our daily prayers and in liturgy as well as in all Eucharistic celebrations," Vaz said and pointed out that the 3-language formula that was hammered out by the then Archbishop Dr Alphonsus Mathias some 25 years ago, when Kannada protagonists were up in arms against Tamil speaking people, especially after the flaring up of Kannada versus Tamil language row between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, was totally unfair to Konkani speaking people as also faithful belonging to other languages like Malayalam or Telugu as it dictated that only Kannada, Tamil and English be used in the parishes.
''Roughly 30 percent of the Catholics in Bangalore Archdiocese are Konkani speaking from coastal Karnataka or other parts of the State, who had come to Bangalore in search of jobs, for education or business after the trend of migration to Mumbai or the Gulf countries was erased. When the Kannada Catholics were agitating against Tamil, the Konkani speaking people being multi-lingual and not keen to add to the problems of the Konkani speaking Mangalorean Archbishop, backed the former against the Tamilians, who were considered as outsiders little realizing that it will prove detrimental to them in the long run," he said.
''Konkani speaking Catholics are denied the opportunity to have at least the Sunday obligatory mass in their mother tongue in parishes in places like Yeshwanthpur, Rajajinagar, Jalahalli, R T Nagar, Viveknagar, Koramangala, Jayanagar etc which had 30 to 50 per cent or even more Konkani speaking people while Kannada speaking Catholics were hardly 20 to 30 per cent with people belonging to Malayalam, Tamil or Telugu accounting for the rest," the situation had become so worse as to see the Konkani speaking people being prevented to have Eucharistic celebrations in their mother tongue during funerals, nuptials and other sacraments and even during the traditional and most important Nativity Feast of Mother Mary. Though some churches allowed Konkani liturgy and masses for the Nativity Feast, there was always resistance from the Kannada speaking people and priests.
'Don’t Let Konkani Die'
As mentioned by Eric Ozario in several occasions ''If a language is blocked out of the liturgy, it may soon fade away from the hearts and minds of people and may eventually die," Latin was a classic example with even Sanskrit was almost a similar case as it was sought to be restricted only to the Brahminical class. Frustrated at the total disregard for their mother-tongue in liturgy, many of the Konkani speaking people were going out of the fold and even embracing breakaway sects or denominations like New Life or Pentecost or even joining Jehovah’s Witnesses.
If the state government gives recognition to Konkani and sets up a separate Academy for the development of Konkani and promotion of its literature and culture, the church should also play a similar pro-active role like the early Christian missionaries who studied the local languages. So there is a need for everyone to come together to save Konkani language and community.
CLICK HERE or visit www.fkca.net to take part in this survey.