Media Release

Mangaluru, Aug 19: Church of St Vincent Ferrer Valencia is celebrating its 27th Konkani Day on Sunday, August 18. As a preparation for this programme, Mass was celebrated by parish priest Fr James D’Souza and Fr William Barrocas con-celebrated the same.

Konkani flag was hoisted in the morning. The special guest for this programme was Fr Alwyn Serrao, principal of Padua College of Management Mangaluru. After hoisting the flag a beautiful message was conveyed by Fr Serrao. He mentioned, “India has one of the highest number of languages in the world. They are divided into 3 categories i.e. scheduled language, official language, classical language. Offical language is being used by the government for official purposes. India does not have any official language as such. But English and Hindi are the official languages of India. Scheduled language are prescribed by the state for their official purposes. Among the scheduled languages Konkani is one of them. Further stressing on the importance people can opt to write Competitive exams such as IAS, IFS etc in Konkani. As it is our mother tongue there is need to love the language. If we do not preserve the culture and the importance, language will be destroyed in the community. There is a need to protect our language and create more awareness of our mother tongue. For example Kodava language of Coorg is an endangered language, like how the Kodava language has been neglected the same way Konkani also can be an endangered language. Hoisting the Konkani flag is a mark of respect to our community.” He also appreciated the program that was conducted and wished everyone good luck for the evening function.

Parish priest Fr James D’Souza, Assistant parish priest Fr Joswin, and parish council vice-president Anil lobo, secretary Lizzie Pinto were also present.

Sweets were distributed to all present. Jasmine compered the programme.