Fr Gerald Ravi D’Souza, SJ

Hazaribagh/Dhanbad (Jharkhand) Apr 21: At around 8.15 in the morning of Tuesday April 21, around 50 young men of saffron brigade with flags written ABVP barged into Holy Cross School, Hazaribagh, shouting slogans against the school to close down after which they got into principal office.

Holy Cross School, a Christian Minority is under constant threat with the reason of fee increment and not following RTE, but as per the rule the school is exempted from RTE and it had given the records to DC, DEO, DSE, and after this, the same letter was published in the Hindi dailies here in Hazaribagh edition of Jharkhand State against the school.

The school management is especially concerned at the happening as none of the officers present came to the assistance of the sisters and staff, instead they were mere spectators when the mob went on kicking the chairs and the doors and asking a sister why there was no statue of Saraswati in the place of St Francis and the photo of Prime Minister Modi. They were constantly using unparliamentary language right in front of the police officials who are supposed to protect the institutions. Their acts before the Principal and the sisters present were very much disturbing. They publicly abused the principal of the school. It appears some of the officials really connived at the attack on the members of the minority community where media and police personnel were present.

They also threatened the school saying if school is not closed they would break the windows and the equipment of the school. They barged out pushing the main gate and shouting the anti Christian slogans entered the St Xavier School and Munnam Public school, which are Minority schools. It shows that the target is only in the Minority Schools. The management is facing lot of problem and threat and constantly disturbing the smooth running of the school. Today’s attack is nothing but an attempt to destabilize the peaceful atmosphere of the schools by spreading hate campaign by the right wing groups.

The District Administration and the department of Education in Jharkhand are apparently trying to enforce the provisions of the Right to Education Act 2009 and thus trying to issue circulars after circulars and publish them in the local daily news papers to tarnish the image of the prestigious minority intuitions.

From the time of the very inception of these institutions, their charism directs the school authorities to educate the economically poor and backward people of the society, which they have been doing in large measure. However, not necessarily under the tag of BPL/BPL card holders as they would like to uphold the privileges granted to the minorities in the very Constitutions of India. It is very much concerning and alarming to note that the Education offices for the past four years and still the missionaries are harassed for the same.

Recently on March 21, when the Deputy Commissioner had specifically directed the presence of heads of these schools, Fr Gerald D’Souza, SJ, the Administrator and Executive Committee member of all De Nobili Schools was deputed to attend the meeting along with representatives from other De Nobili Schools and bring to the district administration notice the above fact that the Minority Schools are not covered under the provisions of Right to Education Act. It was unfortunate that due to some other engagement the DC could not be present at the meeting and the meeting was presided over by B P L Das, ADM, Law & Order. The meeting was also attended by Abhishek Srivastava, SDM, Banke Bihari Singh, DSE, Dhanbad, Ravi Raj Sharma, DTO, Dhanbad and principals from a number of other private Schools.

In this meeting, though only principals were called to discuss the applicability of RTE, there were also a number of other persons were also allowed to be present at the meeting. Some of these persons were known to us from the past for their activities disrupting the normal functioning of our minority schools.

From the very beginning of the meeting when our representatives stated that the minority schools are exempt from the provisions of RTE, these above mentioned persons from the public, began to shout maligning our people, one even calling us anti-nationals, and rule flouters. The DSE publicly went on to brand Fr Gerald as the contractor of legal matters of Jharkhand State and sought opinion of other members present insulting him and humiliating him. To our shock, none of the officers present did anything to restrain the said persons from their abusive and objectionable language and action, but rather some of the officers joined them in insulting the representatives for no fault of theirs.

In a letter to the DC, the school stated, "We are really concerned at the treatment meted out to our minority school representatives at the meeting called by you and attended by them at your direction. We are especially concerned at the happening as none of the officers present came to the assistance of our people when they were so publicly abused by the above said persons. It appeared to us that some of the officials really connived at the attack on the members of the minority community at the meeting convened by you."

"The missionaries include religious priests and nuns who are engaged in the work of education in the state of Jharkhand are expressing great fear even for their own personal safety, let alone the protection of their education institutions from attacks by members of these fundamentalist groups. The recent brutal attack on Christian Religious Sisters at Ranaghat in Nadia District of neighbouring State has only added to our apprehensions," stated the letter.