08-April-2007
New Indian Express dt. 7th April 2007
SC RULING POISED TO OPEN UP CHURCH CASE AFRESH
-- by Mathew A Thomas
Kottayam, April 6: Though the recent pronouncement of the Supreme Court in a case related to the Church feud involving the Orthodox and Jacobite factions underscoring that only lower civil courts are entitled to make observations regarding matters pertaining to individual parishes may look innocuous, it is poised to open up a host of problems for both the factions as the 1934 Church constitution held high by the Orthodox sect as well as the 2002 constitution adopted by the Jacobite followers will be open for debate now.
The Supreme Court has made it clear now that only judgments based in a full hearing of a civil suit will be valid with regards to determination of status and other matters of individual parishes. This is inspite of the fact that an earlier but definite judgment of the Supreme Court in 1995 had upheld the 1934 Church constitution but refused to pass an order on individual parishes since they were not parties in the case.
The Orthodox faction had been maintaining all along that since the 1934 constitution has been upheld and the status of Malankara Metropolitan was accepted in unambiguous terms through the 1995 verdict, all the 1,064 churches including those under the custody of the Patriarch sect will naturally fall within its ambit.
The Orthodox faction even took to the streets demanding government intervention to implement the SC order. But the SC had clearly stated that it is the ‘palli pothu yogam’, ie., the parishnor’s meet, which is supreme in all those matters related to an individual parish.
The pronouncement of the Supreme Court on Wednesday that observation shall not be passed by the High Court in writ petitions involving private parties, apparently keeping in mind that interpretations on various judgments of different courts have made the church issue complicated, has thrown the legal purview back to the grassroots level.
The late Catholicos Baselios Marthoma Mathews-II had approached the High Court for police protection to enter nine important parish churches controlled by the Jacobite sect including Manarcaud St Mary’s Cathedral and Kothamangalam Mar Thoma Cheriya Palli, but a favourable order didn’t come through.
The matter was moved as an appeal petition in the Supreme Court. However, the faction didn’t press it at the end of the hearing sensing the mood of the court but focused on getting the observations made by the High Court in the case removed, such as parishioners had the right to form a separate association.
The observations of the High Court in 2003 had pitchforked the rival Jacobites into a stable position, since they has convened an association in 2002 and adopted a new church constitution on the strength of rights guaranteed by the Indian Constitution under Article 19 (1) (C), 25 & 26, eventually challenging the 1934 Church constitution.
It is another matter that the Supreme Court has also made it clear now that it doesn’t want to go into the merits of the observations of the lower court.
The latest SC ruling has thus opened a new direction to the church case. While the Orthodox sect will have to determine the status of parishes in local civil courts individually even when reigning supreme with the sanctity of the 1934 constitution and probably by holding the status of Malankara Metropolitan for Catholicos Baselios Didymos-I, the opposite Jacobite faction will have to grapple with the prospect of legal scrutiny of the Church constitution adopted in 2002, in addition to issues related to the status of individual parishes.
Given the fact that the 1995 SC verdict came in a civil suit originally moved by the predecessor of the late Catholicos Baselios Marthoma Mathews-II, in the early seventies, issues related to individual parishes under the Orthodox and Jacobite fold in Malankara will definitely end as a long drawn affair.
Concerned News:
SC RULING ON THE POLICE PROTECTION CASE FILED BY METHRAN KAKSHI dt. 5 April 2007
1. Mathrubhumi & Mangalam reports on the Supreme Court judgment