MANGALORE: St. Thomas The Apostle Church, Nirkan, Vogga, in Bantwal is all set to celebrate its platinum jubilee on December 28. The church was carved out of Agrar Church by then Bishop of Mangalore Diocese Valerian D'Souza on March 25, 1930. Anthony Noronha took over as the first parish priest of the church on April 27, 1930.

Andrew Leo D'Souza, parish priest, told presspersons here on Wednesday that the church has seen a lot of development since it was founded 75 years ago. K. Francis Suares who took over as parish priest on April 11, 1943 took the first real steps towards increasing amenities, he said. Appreciating the support from the church development committee in his endeavours, he said even local elected representatives expedited the process with their contribution.

Referring to one of the development schemes take up as part of the celebrations, he said the committee will set up an education corpus to ensure that all Catholic children in the parish are educated up to 10th standard. Stating that the Bishop of Mangalore Diocese, Aloyisus Paul D'Souza, will dedicate a new 55-metre-tall belfry, built at an estimated cost of Rs. 3.5 lakhs, at the jubilee day celebrations, he said Jerald D'Souza, Vicar Forane of Belthangady, will preside over the evening function on December 28. B. Nagaraj Shetty, MLA; B. Ramanath Rai, former Minister; Vinaykumar Sorake, former MP; and Savitha and Ananda Acharya, presidents of Kavalapadoor and Channaithodi gram panchayats, will be the chief guests.

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