Franco Mulakkal, the Jalandhar Bishop accused of rape by a nun, on Saturday asked his deputy to administer the diocese while he faces the police probe in Kerala, but insisted that he hadn\u2019t stepped down yet.<\/p>\n
\u201cI leave everything into the hand of God as I await the result of the findings of the probing the allegation. In my absence Msgr. Matthew Kokkandam will administer the Diocese as the normal practice when I am away from the Diocese,\u201d Mulakkal stated in his letter addressed to \u201cFathers, Sisters and Brothers\u201d.<\/p>\n
The statement was initially seen as an offer to step down.<\/p>\n
James, the Bishop\u2019s representative ruled out that he has stepped down. \u201cHe (Bishop) has only appointed Father Matthew to administer the functioning of the Diocese in his absence as Bishop is going to join the investigation in Kerala.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Friday, the Bishop received official summons from Vaikom (Kerala) deputy superintendent of police (DSP) K Subhash, who is heading the investigation in the case.<\/p>\n
The Jalandhar commissioner of police (CP) Praveen Sinha served the summons to the Bishop, asking him to appear before them for the investigation on September 19.<\/p>\n
The Bishop in his letter also requested prayers for him and for the alleged victim and her supporters who have come out against him so that the \u201cdivine intervention may bring about a change of heart and the truth of the matter may reveal\u201d.<\/p>\n
Catholic nuns in Kerala\u2019s Kochi city have been on a protest for the last eight days demanding the arrest of Bishop. They have accused church officials of trying to scuttle their agitation with a combination of promises and intimidation.<\/p>\n
The victim had recently sought urgent intervention of the Vatican for justice and demanded the Bishop\u2019s removal as the head of the Jalandhar diocese.<\/p>\n
She alleged that Bishop Mulakkal was using \u201cpolitical and money power\u201d to \u201cbury\u201d the case against him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Franco Mulakkal, the Jalandhar Bishop accused of rape by a nun, on Saturday asked his deputy to administer the diocese […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paZdga-15Z","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4215"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4215\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4217,"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4215\/revisions\/4217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oyspa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}