Three years after it announced that it was pulling out of the work of caring for orphans up for adoption, a nun of Mother Teresa’s mission is charged with selling babies. What led to it?
~By Sujit Bhar
In an incident that sent shock waves across the country, two women associated with the Missionaries of Charity were arrested on July 5 by the police in Ranchi, selling babies. Sister Concilia Balsam and Anima Indwar, a helper-cum-social worker associated with the Ranchi chapter of the worldwide organisation, were held for selling three babies for Rs 50,000 each. Another baby was given away for “free”, reports said without giving any further details.
Sister N Prema, Mother Superior of the Missionaries of Charity, said in a press statement: “We are deeply saddened and grieved by the recent developments at Missionaries of Charity Home—Nirmal Hriday at East Jail Road, Ranchi… we wish to express regret and sorrow for what happened and desire to express in unequivocal terms our condemnation of individual actions which have nothing to do with the congregation of the Missionaries of Charity.”
However, trying to insulate the main organisation from the incidents and terming these as “individual actions”, seems nothing more than a search for a face-saver for the mission. A source who is in the know of developments at the mission told India Legal that following the death of Sister Nirmala, who was in charge after the passing away of Mother Teresa in 1997, not only has the overall discipline of the mission deteriorated, there has also been a rather steep fall in donations coming in from established international sources for the mission’s massive network.