the goan I network
PANAJI
In a press note issued on Saturday, the church body has stated that “the State government’s ban against certain groups and individuals from entering the State while permitting their affiliate organisations and collaborators to have a free run at spreading hate and seditious ideologies is hypocritical, worrisome and threatening to the communal harmony in the State.”
“The emboldened rantings from some of the religious leaders and politicians to foist a theocratic state are an open rejection of the secular and democratic ideals of the Constitution of India. The advice given to people of a particular faith to store arms in their houses is tantamount to a call to violence and terrorism,” stated Fr Savio Fernandes, executive secretary, CSJP.
“The people of Goa need to know the mind of the government about how such divisive, discriminatory and violent statements as pointed out above are different from the slogans of ‘Azaadi’ and sympathy to the J&K or Naxalite issue, in which students and social activists are hauled up and even jailed for sedition and anti-national activity,” he stated.
“The Goa government owes a response to its people in the background of the nationwide growing insecurity and anguish among citizens, including concerns raised by 65 retired IAS and IPS officers about the ‘tacit complicity or active encouragement of State machinery’ in relation to activities inciting intolerance, vigilantism and hyper nationalism,” Fr Fernandes said, while reminding the government that they have a duty to uphold the Constitution of India and to protect the constitutional rights of the citizens.
