The Hindu : Front Page : Neyyatinkara Bishop's House attacked

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Oct 18, 2005

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Neyyatinkara Bishop's House attacked

Staff Reporter

Guard injured, three vehicles damaged in the pre-dawn attack by a gang

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A security guard was injured and three vehicles were damaged when four unidentified persons armed with wooden staffs attacked the residence of the Latin Catholic Bishop of Neyyatinkara early on Monday.

The Bishop Vincent Samuel was sleeping in his private quarters on the first floor of the house when the attack occurred around 2.30 a.m. The security guard, Bernard, was assaulted when he tried to prevent the attackers from entering the building. The miscreants went on the rampage smashing windowpanes and also the windscreens of the vehicles parked in the compound. They severed power supply to the building before mounting the attack and then entered the compound by scaling the wall. The attackers fled the scene when they spotted a police motorcycle patrol approaching the Bishop's House around 2.45 a.m.

The attack had occurred some hours after certain members of the Manickapuram parish staged a protest in front of the Bishop's House demanding that their local priest, who was transferred recently, be reinstated.

The police suspect that the miscreants were trying to implicate the parish members in the crime by choosing to attack after their protest.

"It was a ploy aimed at creating discord between certain sections of the Latin Catholic community in Neyyatinkara. The miscreants also wanted their identity concealed and the police investigation thrown off track," a senior official who was at the spot told The Hindu.

He said that Joseph Mathias, a priest attached to the Bishop's House, was a witness to the murder of one Krishnadas, who was beaten to death in front of the Bishop's residence at Pathankallu in 2003.

The police were probing whether the attack was carried out to intimidate the priest from deposing at the trial of the case.

The police were also investigating a local politician, an accused in the case relating to the attack on the Neyyatinkara police station in November 2002, in connection with the incident. The Government has transferred the case to the Crime Branch.

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