A notice was issued by the Kerala police on Wednesday to Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jalandhar, who has been accused of rape by a nun, and asked him to be present before the investigation team on September 19.
The Nun accused Mulakkal of rape and unnatural sex multiple times between 2014 and 2016, but he rejected the charges as “baseless and concocted” and added that he had the right to take legal action. Terming the allegations against him “serious”, the bishop had said that only three persons knew the truth, the complainant’s sister, himself and God. The bishop also accused the nun of “blackmailing” him by the first letter she (nun) wrote to Mother Superior, demanding Bihar (church) to be treated as a separate region and that she be re-instated as Superior of the House. The nun made a petition to the Vatican representative in India, following the bishop’s reaction and alleging that he was using “political and money power” to bury the case and solicited his removal from the post. The nun said that she had turned to the Church authorities for justice in a letter to Giambattista Diquattro, Vatican’s Apostolic Nuncio (a diplomatic mission). She alleged that by continuing in the position of Jalandhar diocese, Mulakkal and his close associates were using the wealth of the diocese to divert the course of the police investigation.]]>
