Probe team will return on Monday to the Vatican Embassy as they have now applied for permission
New Delhi; A Kerala Police team, probing the case of a Catholic bishop accused of sexually abusing a nun, failed to record the statement of the Vatican representative on Saturday, as they had not taken prior permission for it.
The team is now expected to travel to Punjab where they will meet the accused, Franco Mulakkal, Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Jalandhar.
According to the probe team, they will return on Monday to the Vatican Embassy as they have now applied for permission to take the statement.
The six-member team led by Deputy Superintendent of Police A.T. Subhash, during their first stop in Delhi, was to take the statement of a city-based couple who complained against the nun. But the couple told the police that their complaint was based on a misunderstanding and they had since withdrawn it.
According to the police team, they will now meet the Ujjain Bishop of the Catholic dioceses, whom she had informed about the manner in which she was subjected to abuse.
In June 2018, the nun alleged that Mulakkal sexually abused her several times at a convent in Kuruvalangadu near Kottayam, Kerala between 2014 and 2016.
An FIR was registered against the bishop and a detailed 114-page statement was taken from the nun and other inmates of the convent.
Mulakkal, however, denies the allegations.
Statements were also taken from the head of the Syro-Malabar Church, Cardinal Mar George Alencherry, and a few other former nuns who were residents at the convent.
