Ex-Goa RSS chief’s remarks on Saint Francis Xavier trigger protests

Panaji: The former Goa RSS chief Subhash Velingkar’s call for “DNA test” of Saint Francis Xavier has led to protests prompting a church body to appeal for restraint.

Fr Savio Fernandes, executive secretary, Council for Social Justice and Peace (CSJP) condemned Subhash Velingkar’s call terming it ‘insulting and derogatory’.

Fr Savio Fernandes said that the RSS leader’s statement ‘deeply hurt the religious sentiments not only of the Catholics’ but those ‘belonging to other faith communities and who revere our Saint’.

The executive secretary of CSJP urged people ‘not to distract attention’ from issues that trouble the state, adding that ‘We express our solidarity with the non-violent protests’.

Responding to the situation, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said the BJP was ‘deliberately stoking communal tensions” in the state.

Taking to platform X, Rahul Gandhi said under the BJP rule the harmony in the state is facing attack with a RSS leader provoking Christians, while Sangh outfits calling for economic boycott of Muslims.

The Congress leader claimed that the BJP’s strategy was to divide people while ‘exploiting ecologically sensitive areas by illegally converting green land and bypassing environmental regulations’.

Meanwhile, police on Friday night charged Velingkar for his ‘maligning speech against St Francis Xavier’, which outraged ‘religious feelings’ as well as ‘insulting religious beliefs’.

Hundreds took to streets outside the police station in Margao, blocking roads, demanding the arrest of Velingkar.

The state saw protest alongside those in Old Goa, Canacona, Panaji, Anjuna and Ponda.

Police resorted to lathi-charge to disperse some protesters in Margao on Saturday night.