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Pope wants to visit India, govt not sure

George Iype in New Delhi

Pope John Paul II is eager to visit India later this year to release an apostolic exhortation for the Asian continent, but the Vatican is unsure if the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government would grant permission to the head of the Catholic Church.

Official sources said the Vatican had recently put in a formal request with the government for the Pope to visit India either in October or November to present an apostolic exhortation and bring to a close the Special Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for Asia.

The Special Assembly was part of a series of meetings the Pope convened across the world to prepare the Church for the next millennium. The papal visit will also coincide with the celebrations of Jesus Christ's birth anniversary in Asia.

Sources said the papal request is now pending with the ministry of external affairs and the prime minister's office. They said neither the government nor the Bharatiya Janata Party leadership "is comfortable with the idea of the Catholic Church launching an evangelical mission from India."

Church officials said the Pope expressed his desire to come over to India after the Chinese government recently rejected a similar Vatican request for a papal visit to Hong Kong. The Vatican had approached Beijing through the Chinese embassy in Rome.

But the Chinese foreign ministry informed the Pope that since the Vatican maintains diplomatic relations with Taiwan, it would be inappropriate for him to visit Hong Kong to release an evangelical document.

Hong Kong along with India and Iraq were the likely venues that the Vatican had shortlisted for the Pope to present his exhortation in Asia for the new millennium.

But now that China has rejected the papal request, the Pope is said to be keen to visit India for two reasons. First, John Paul II wants to release the apostolic exhortation in a multi-cultural, religious country.

Second, Indian Church leaders are lobbying hard for the papal visit in the wake of anti-Christian violence early this year in the country. Indian Church leaders hope that a visit from their supreme head will help the Church's desire to initiate and broaden a dialogue with Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam in the country.

Quoting Vatican Deputy for General Affairs Archbishop Gioavnni Battista Re and Secretary for Relations with States Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran in Rome, Church sources said that if permission was granted the Pope would probably go either to Bombay or New Delhi.

Archbishop Lorenzo Baldisseri, the newly-appointed Papal Nuncio to India, is expected to take up the Vatican request with the Vajpayee government after he presents his credentials later this month.

Officials said a papal visit was 'a sensitive issue' as it is basically an evangelisation programme and therefore the government would not take a hasty decision anticipating opposition from the Bharatiya Janata Party leadership and the Sangh Parivar.

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