Around 22,000 inmates of the homes run by Missionaries of Charity may be hit across India with a shortage of basic food and medicine, as news that the “Indian government has frozen the accounts of the Missionaries of Charity” has begun circulating on Monday, December 27. The inmates in the many homes run by the charity include children, seriously unwell people, apart from the sisters and staff who take care of them daily.
Mamata Banerjee, Chief Minister, West Bengal, expressed her shock “that on Christmas, Union Ministry FROZE ALL BANK ACCOUNTS of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity in India!”
Shocked to hear that on Christmas, Union Ministry FROZE ALL BANK ACCOUNTS of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity in India!
Their 22,000 patients & employees have been left without food & medicines.
While the law is paramount, humanitarian efforts must not be compromised.
— Mamata Banerjee (@MamataOfficial) December 27, 2021
While an official confirmation was awaited, Christian news website Matters India had reported that Missionary Charity Sisters and Brothers had “confirmed the news”. However the news link appears broken at the time of publishing this report.
Earlier, a WhatsApp message stated that the superior general of the MC Sisters said all the accounts of brothers and sisters had been frozen, adding, “Their 22000 patients and employees are left without food and medicine.” Incidentally, on December 27 a hearing for anticipatory bail for the Sisters of Mother Teresa Ashram, Vadodara, is due in the district court. According to a source, a message from Br. Paul Eaton MC Superior General of the MC brothers confirmed that “all the accounts in India for MC brothers and sisters” were frozen.
The Vicar General, Archdiocese of Calcutta, Fr. Dominic Gomes issued a statement saying, “In freezing the bank accounts of Missionaries of Charity Sisters and Brothers congregations, Government agencies have given a cruel Christmas gift to the poorest of the poor. Besides over 22,000 direct dependants and beneficiaries at their centres across the country, MC Sisters and Brothers reach out to uplift thousands and are often the only friends of the lepers and social outcast no one will even venture near. Overlooking the fact MCs of St. Mother Teresa give up all worldly goods, sleep on the floor and, and earn no money – giving whatever they have in service to the poorest in every corner of the earth, especially our poorest of Indians – this latest attack on the Christian Community and their social outreach is even more a dastardly attack on the poorest of India’s poor, who the MC congregation serves.”
He has “condemned the Government action against the MC and are appalled by the timing and lack of empathy to consider the humanitarian disaster this decision will cause” and added that “the bogey of “Conversion” always been raised as justification, is more than patently false, boggles the mind with its incredulity – had any Christian organisation seriously tried to “convert” with the efficiency they run their educational, medical and social intuitions; there would indeed be many more Christians converted in the 2,000 years Christianity has been on Indian soil that the 2.3% minority today. Christianity, across the globe – is not defined by conversion, but by their unappalled love for their neighbour in action through their social outreach and social justice in society.”
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