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Witness in rape case against ex-bishop says she is facing threats
Sister Lisy Vadakkayi also claimed that there were many attempts to delay the trial of former bishop of Jalandhar Franco Mulakkal who is accused of raping a nun.
Sister Lisy Vadakkayil, one of the main witnesses in the rape case against former bishop of Jalandhar Franco Mullakal said on Monday that she was facing threats and was being pressured to retract her statement to the police.
“I am facing enough threats. Even last week I got some threatening letters and calls. Come what may, I will not retract my statements given to the police,” she told a television channel in Kochi.
She also said there were many attempts to dub her a mentally deranged person to weaken the case and urged authorities to speed up the trial against the powerful former bishop. The trial in the case had started in Kottayam additional sessions court last month.
She also claimed that there were many attempts to delay the trial.
“I am leading a secluded life. For many, I am an outcaste for telling truth. I don’t know how long I can withstand such pulls and pressures. It will be good if authorities speed up the trial,” she said.
Six months ago police had registered a case against a convent in Muvattupuzha (Ernakulam) for allegedly locking her up and torturing her. But later a spokesman of the Franciscan Clarist Congregation had denied ill-treatment saying the nun had cooked up the story when she was asked to go to her positing in Vijayawada. The nun was later produced before a local court and it allowed her to go with her brother.
Activists said such vindictive actions by church authorities towards witnesses were aimed at weakening the case against Mulakkal whose bail the trial court extended till the next date of hearing on January 6. Father Kuriakose Kattuthara, who was another witness in the case, was found dead at Jalandhar under mysterious circumstances last year.
“We fear there are attempts to delay the trial indefinitely like the Abhaya case of 1992. There are many attempts to intimidate witnesses also,” said an activist who did not want to be identified. Sister Abhaya was found dead in a well on the premises of the Pious X Convent in Kottayam in 1992. It was initially dismissed as a case of suicide by the state crime branch but the CBI later concluded that it was a murder. The trial in the case finally began 27 years in August this year.
In June 2018, a 43-year-old nun, also a mother superior, had complained that Mulakkal had raped her on several occasions between 2014 and 2016. When police failed to arrest him, five nuns had staged a sit-in protest in Kochi. Later a special investigation team was formed and it arrested him in September last year. After spending three weeks in judicial custody, Mulakkal later secured bail.Church authorities have been accused of trying to intimidate and transfer the five nuns who stood with the victim. The victim and five nuns are now confined at their convent in Kuravilangad in Kottayam.
