Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi
Udupi, Nov 6: The suicide case of Fr Mahesh D’Souza, principal of Don Bosco School and assistant parish priest of Shirva Church, is taking new developments on everyday basis since some days.
On November 2, which is observed as All Souls Day, the events turned ugly as a sizable number of people gheroed the parish priest after the cemetery visit, and asked the status of enquiry of deceased priest's suicide case.
Fr Mahesh D’Souza, according to police preliminary report, committed suicide on the night of October 11, 2019 at his office chamber at Don Bosco School. The parish priest reportedly answered the queries of people, the video of which went viral on social media subsequently. But by looking at the crowd coming down to him, he had to report to the police for his personal safety as well as to avoid any untoward incidents.
Soon after, Shirva Church premises turned into a tensed place, but the police force arrived on time. The crowd gathered at the venue demanded bishop's visit, and also questioned the presence of police force at church premises. One person asked "In last more than 100 years never the police entered the church like this,” But the police had to remind him, what could the priest do, if the mob attacked him?
The next day, event went uglier when the bishop visited Shirva Church as promised. But crowd refused to listen to his address. The young and dynamic superintendent of police (SP) Nisha James was the highlight of the day as she was bold enough to narrate the progress of enquiry. She also entertained the questions from people. Hardly any police officer of her rank comes open and takes people's questions in public. She repeated the same issue that the family of Fr Mahesh requested with police and the diocese not to pursue the suicide case further.
In a dramatic move, Fr Mahesh D’Souza’s family issued a press statement on late night of Sunday, November 3, claiming that they never asked anyone not to pursue the case. This statement indeed put the diocese and police in embarrassment situation. But sources close to Daijiworld have informed that Fr Mahesh's family had given in writing to diocese and police that, the family would not pursue the case. It is learnt that official reactions will come soon from both diocese and police once postmortem and other lab reports are out. It is also reported that, the real reason for suicide will come out from police soon, once the investigation process is complete.
Meantime, the parishioners of Shirva say that the parish is now a divided house. Daijiworld spoke to several people in Shirva. Their opinions say that Shirva is indeed a divided house now.
"The kind of protest that took place on Saturday and Sunday is welcome. But the fact is majority of protestors do not belong to Shirva parish. They are from other parishes in the Udupi diocese. Parishioners of Shirva, like any other parishes, are peace loving people, and in no way want to spoil the name of parish.” opined a parishioner.
Another parishioner said "This is nothing but politics. A political leader from neighbouring parish of Shirva wants to settle scores with another political leader from the community of same party by highlighting this issue. The common parishioners are suffering because of their rivalry."
A young lady who is active in youth organisation of diocese told Daijiworld that "One political leader says that he can write it his blood that, Fr Mahesh D’Souza could not commit suicide. How can he mislead the investigations in public? He is same person who pushed the police and entered the bishop's meeting venue forcefully. He should be extremely lucky as police did not file case against him for obstructing duty. How can the people respect a man if he does not know how to respect the law?"
"We want peace back in Shirva. At the moment we are like orphans as no priest is ready to come to Shirva looking at the seriousness of the case and protest. Just because 10% of the people want to destroy the peace and divide the parish, we all are suffering." says a lady, who wants justice for Fr Mahesh suicide. but not in this way.
"We need the justice. We need the reason for Fr Mahesh’s death. Bishop was late in giving the statement to people. If he had done that initially, this situation would not have arisen. But still we respect him. He might be having his own reasons," another parishioner told Daijiworld.
"What is the message we are giving to other communities? Our children were seen abusing our bishop. He is our spiritual leader. His car tyres were punctured and he was humiliated. Video abusing him was made viral. Are we true Christians?" a lady broke down while she gave this statement to Daijiworld.
A protest was held again on Tuesday also in which around 500 people took part. As per sources all of them are from outside Shirva and only handful of them belonged to Shirva parish. "If really it was a Shirva parishioners’ protest, why Shirva parishioners did not gather? Is Shirva a divided house for few people's selfish motives? Cannot we trust our police while they are doing such an excellent job? Why they are circulating photos of Fr Mahesh's hanging and getting publicity from it and misleading people? Are we living in a cultured world? Where are we heading? Don't we have faith in police, court and the system?" an angry man belonging to Shirva parish questioned after chaos in the church premises.
Daijiworld has learnt that, police force specially the investigation office, CI Mahesh Prasad, SI Khader, ACP and SP have done a tremendous job in maintaining the law and order situation during the protest.
"November 2 and 3 are black days in the history of Shirva parish. I do not know whether such a beautiful parish will remain the same like before." tells a devotee to Daijiworld.
Daijiworld has learnt that entire community wants a fast track enquiry into the Fr Mahesh's suicide case and if anyone is guilty, they should be punished and the truth must come out at the soonest.
A source from Shirva told Daijiworld that there could be other reasons behind the protests at church premises other than Fr Mahesh’s death. "Settling scores with the parish priest by 'contractor lobby' and 'tenants' issues under church property, and also involvement of another political leader from Moodubelle for gaining political mileage could also be the hidden issues in the protests agenda. However, all these issues could soon to be exposed one by one with proof.” the source said.
A church authority is also seeking legal opinion for maligning names of priest and bishop by some people speaking to the press on the protest day with statements of hatred and unfounded allegations, followed by making the video and audio clips viral on social media.