HC to hear Church cases on merit on Nov. 16

It says efforts for rapprochement in Malankara Church case have failed

The Kerala High Court on Wednesday observed that it would decide on the petitions filed by vicars of various parishes of the Malankara Church seeking police protection for performing services on merit on November 16, as its efforts to drill sense into the Orthodox and Jacobite factions and find a peaceful solution to the disputes did not succeed.

When the cases came up before Justice Devan Ramachandran, the Additional Advocate General submitted that there was no possibility of a reconciliation of the disputes. In fact, the heads of both the factions had been contacted and the Patriarch faction was not willing to concede.

During the hearing, the judge orally observed that it was a tragedy that one of the factions did not want to end the disputes. The court did its best to end the disputes as it was trued to its constitutional conscience. But nobody wanted to hear and understand. As the saying went, good pieces of advice were rarely heeded to.