Now, VHP says Pope is welcome as State guest

AURANGABAD, OCT 31: The Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) on Sunday said it was not against the visit of Pope John Paul II to India as a State ...

AURANGABAD, OCT 31: The Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) on Sunday said it was not against the visit of Pope John Paul II to India as a State guest but against Church policies.

“The Pope is a State guest and we welcome him. We are not against him or Christians, but we are against the policies of the churches,” VHP vice-president Acharya Giriraj Kishore told reporters here. Kishore said Goa was governed by Roman Catholic rulers for four hundred years and thus, the Pope should express regrets about their deeds, he demanded.

“The Pope should declare that his visit is not for the spread of Christanity in India,” the VHP leader said. The Sanskriti Raksha Manch, a front organisation of the VHP, was spearheading an agitation against the Pope’s visit and had organised a Goa-Delhi march demanding apology from the Catholic pontiff for the alleged atrocities committed by the Portuguese on the people of Goa.

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Referring to reports in a section of the media about his recent statement on the Pope, Kishore said, “I hadnot mentioned the Pope as a bandit at Patna press conference.” He expressed satisfaction over the Government’s decision not to telecast live on Doordarshan the holy mass at Jawaharlal Nehru stadium in New Delhi on November 7.

Meanwhile, the Goa-Delhi rath yatra to protest Pope John Paul II’s visit to India arrived here this evening amidst the waving of black flags by Youth Congress workers. The yatra, which was barred by Digvijay Singh’s Congress Government from entering Madhya Pradesh, was received at the outskirts of the city by VHP activists.