Thiruvananthapuram: Believers defied police pickets to install a wooden cross and reinstate an altar, where a Mass was celebrated, in place of demolished structures in Bonacaud on Sunday morning.
As tempers were frayed, Forest Minister K Raju convened a meeting at 9 a.m. on August 29 at his Secretariat annexe chamber to solve the issues relating to the destruction of holy crosses.
Around 11am, some 1,000 believers, mostly members of Kerala Catholic Youth Movement, reached the forest check post at the foothills of Bonacaud estate. Around two dozen policemen and an equal number of forest officials blocked them.
“However protesters outnumbered the forces and marched ahead. A section of agitators trekked 12 km into the forest land to reach the spot of demolition. Several priests accompanied the group,” said a police officer.
Meanwhile, the forest officials probing the demolition reiterated that they could not identify miscreants. Senior officials declined to comment as the probe was in progress.
The Neyyattinkara Latin diocese in a pastoral letter warned of strong agitation till crosses uprooted from the Bonacaud area are reinstalled.
Neyyatinkara Bishop Vincent Samuel in the pastoral letter, read out in churches during the mass on Sunday, said that all priests and nuns of the diocese would fast in front of the Secretariat on Tuesday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
The pastoral letter also demanded a Crime Branch inquiry. The letter urged the laity to organise prayer meetings in all parishes to protest against the destruction of the cross.
The letter claimed that the cross was installed 60 years ago at Bonacaud even before the Kerala Forest Act had come into force. Hence, the argument that the cross was installed in protected forest was not valid. Till date, Kurisumala area was being seen as a seat of communal amity. However, crosses were destroyed following intervention by certain communal forces.
The Kurisumala pilgrimage silver jubilee was celebrated last year resulting in a surge of pilgrims, which had perhaps angered some sections. Subsequently, they threatened to destroy prayer facilities. The Forest Department should clarify how those who destroyed Crosses reached Kurisumala area, well past the forest check-post. This was because the forest department has claimed that the cross was not destroyed by the anti-socials, the pastoral letter claimed.
