UPDATE (INDIA): Jesuit authorities make mockery of negotiations
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40th DAY OF THE HUNGER STRIKE
PLEASE VISIT THE JESUIT HOUSES IN YOUR COUNTRY!
For your support, we are sending you the following updates on Fr. Pallath¡¯s hunger strike.
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Police commissioner at his persuasive best fails to end the impasse
Despite the failure of the 5-hour marathon talks he initiated, the Police Commissioner of Calicut Mr. Sanjeev Patjoshi spent a good another 2 hours today exclusively with Fr. Pallath trying persuade him to end the hunger strike in deference to the critical turn his health. Against the adamancy of the Jesuits not to do anything substantial, the commissioner was left with no option but to personally request Fr. Pallath to end the fast.
The two hour long high-pressure deliberations ended when finally Fr. Pallath told the commissioner,
\”Your request, in essence is that I compromise my ideals for the pittance that the Jesuit authorities are offering. Let me tell you, forgoing food, I can live for a few more days. But forgoing my cause, I will die instantaneously. No, not figuratively; literally.\”
Jesuit authorities make mockery of negotiations and bid to mislead the press
The five-hour deliberations of the previous day failed to produce any result, given the adamant stand of the Jesuits. When reference was drawn to the specific terms of the clause that were violated by them, (dealing with the Fr. Pallath’s maintenance after April 2001), the Jesuits were in a fix. That is when the masterminds came up with a suggestion that was meant to ridicule the whole conciliation process. They said they were willing to pick up the rent of the house in which Fr. Pallath is staying, for two months! Yes exactly two months. The conciliation effort was doomed to failure against such a mindset.
But many of yesterday newspapers reported as if the talks were on the verge of successful conclusion, awaiting just a nod from Fr. Pallath. This deliberate falsification was the handwork of the Jesuits. Once the deliberate violation of the terms of the earlier agreement became undeniably obvious, the Jesuits are trying to spread the impression that they are not as adamant as people consider them to be. The Jesuits have been willing to show humanitarian consideration to Fr. Pallalth, is the impression sough to be created. What they fail to report (or have not been told by the Jesuits) is that the magnanimity of the Jesuits to some one who spent a lifetime in their service and was then literally thrown in to the streets at the age of 55 is two months rent.
