Indian government says it will not hand over remains of Mother Teresa
(Oct.14,2009): India will not yield to Albania's request to hand over the remains
of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, an Indian government spokesman confirmed. Mother
Teresa was "an Indian citizen and she is resting in her own country, her own land,"
the Indian Express newspaper quoted Vishnu Prakash, spokesman for the Ministry for
External Affairs, as saying in its Oct. 13 edition. "The question of returning her
remains does not arise at all," he said. The government comments followed international
media reports that Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha had asked the Indian government
to hand over the remains of the ethnic Albanian nun for the 100th anniversary of her
birth next August. Sr.Christy, a member of the Missionaries of Charity, the religious
order founded by Mother Teresa, told the Asian church news agency UCA News, that her
congregation had not heard anything about such a demand officially but had seen the
media reports.She dismissed such reports as "speculations" andadded that the nuns
would not comment on them. Mother Teresa was born to an ethnic Albanian family in
Skopje, in what is now part of Macedonia. She came to India in 1929 and became an
Indian citizen in 1947. The late nun based her life and work in Calcutta. Following
her death in 1997, she was buried inside the headquarters of her congregation in the
eastern Indian city in West Bengal State..