ID04642.1489 March 17, 2008 58 EM-lines (615 words)

INDIA Catholics Upset After Government Office Refuses To Make Good Friday A Holiday

By Michael Gonsalves

MUMBAI, India (UCAN) -- Catholic workers in a federal government office in western India are upset about not having a holiday on Good Friday.

The Government Mint in Mumbai, which makes coins, did not include the Christian holy day in its list of holidays. It also refused to accept leave applications for that day from Catholics, workers said.

The mint is in India's commercial capital, formerly called Bombay, 1,410 kilometers southwest of New Delhi. Mumbai is also the base of Bombay archdiocese, which has about 500,000 Catholics, more than any other Church jurisdiction in India.

A Catholic woman employee told UCA News the mint's 45 Catholic employees jointly wrote to officials demanding that Good Friday be included in the holiday list of 2008. They sent the demand after noticing Good Friday, which falls on March 21 this year, missing from a list published in December 2007.

The woman and other employees who spoke with UCA News did so on condition of anonymity, because government rules bar them from speaking to the media on such matters without permission from mint authorities.

Even after several reminders, they said, Good Friday was not included in the list. Mint general manager Niranjankumar Choudhary offered to let them report for work, mark their attendance and go home, but he would not accept leave applications, they said. "It goes against our conscience. It is immoral and against the principles we believe," an agitated Catholic employee told UCA News.

Nonetheless, Dolphy D'Souza, president of Bombay Catholic Sabha (forum), told UCA News on March 7 that Choudhary had agreed to make changes. He had also asked the mint's staff welfare committee to make a revised holiday list that includes Good Friday. But the committee has not done this, "for reasons best known to them," D'Souza rued.

Some Catholic employees told UCA News the authorities wanted to avoid being closed for three consecutive days, which might adversely affect office functioning. This year the day after Good Friday is Holi, the popular Hindu festival of colors, a holiday throughout India, and Sunday is the weekly day off.

According to D'Souza, government rules ensure that every religion gets a minimum of two holidays to mark their most important festivals, but Christians were accorded only one holiday, on Christmas, Dec. 25.

"It is absolutely discriminatory not granting holiday on the most sacred religious event" of Christians, D'Souza said. Christians commemorate Christ's crucifixion on Good Friday and prepare to celebrate his resurrection two days later on Easter Sunday.

D'Souza said he has written to federal Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, under whose jurisdiction the mint falls, to intervene and ensure justice to the Catholics.

Choudhary was unavailable for comment.

George Menezes, former president of the All India Catholic Union, told UCA News on March 11 that Christians are a miniscule minority of less than 3 percent of India's 1 billion people. Hindu officials do not care about them, especially in government departments, he said. "It is time the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India took up the issue with the state and federal governments, and settled it once and for all," Menezes added.

Bombay archdiocesan spokesperson Father Anthony Charanghat said government should become "more sensitive to the religious sentiments" of Catholics. Not allowing them a holiday on Good Friday "is a blatant discrimination, as it is important for Catholics to attend prayer services," said the priest, who edits the archdiocesan weekly, The Examiner.

Pradeep Deshpande, Hindu secretary of Mumbai-based Ekta (oneness), a forum for social harmony, told UCA News it is "unfortunate" mint employees were not accorded a holiday on Good Friday, since several other government offices have declared the day a holiday.

END

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INDIA Lent Is 40 Days For Some, 50 Days For Others (April 1, 2004)

INDIA UCAN Feature - Nagas Kill A Cock, Take A Bath To Celebrate Lent (March 1, 1999)

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Michael Gonsalves
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