‘CPM harassing our schools, colleges’

The Catholic church in Kerala has alleged that the CPI(M)-led government is persecuting it. The Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Conference (KCBC) alleged that the University of Calicut cancelled affiliation to four Catholic institutions after the inter-church council refused to toe the government line on self-financing colleges.

The Left Democratic Front (LDF) government is trying to deprive the community of rights assured by the Constitution, a document released after a meeting of the bishops’ association in Kochi said.

The paper, prepared by representatives of the Latin Catholic, Syro-Malabar and Syro-Malankara churches, alleged that the LDF government has been pursuing an anti-minority stand ever since it came to power in 2006.

It said the government is trying to arm-twist the church into signing an agreement on seat reservations to self-financing professional colleges and was intimidating the church-run higher educational institutions.

The church has been waging a war against the LDF ever since the Kerala Professional Colleges Act 2006, which empowers the government to decide on the minority status of a community on the basis of its total population, the number of colleges run by it and the proportion of students belonging to it vis-à-vis their counterparts from non-minority community. The high court quashed the Act, yet the government tried to force educational institutions run by minorities to sign an agreement on 50% reservation of seats. Though other managements reached an agreement with the government, church-run institutions did not sign it on the advice of the KCBC, the paper said.

KCBC alleges the University of Calicut cancelled affiliation of four church-run education institutions – including two medical colleges – as part of its pressurising tactics. These institutions had been providing quality education. The medical colleges had received approval from the Union government and the Medical Council of India, the paper said.