The Delhi Parsi Anjuman proposals
A scurrilous email/app has been circulating alleging the Delhi Parsi Anjuman (DPA) "trustees prepared a change of rules book (sic) and silently circulated to a small group of persons hoping to get the changes carried out silently without any discussion.”
Changes include opening up the Anjuman membership to all communities and permitting DPA trustees "to throw out any member (Parsi) they feel is not suitable.”
The message also alleges the head priest (Cawas Bagli) has been suspended on flimsy reasons "for 15 days to terrify him (and) silence dissenting voices… Therefore the DPA now falls into the hands of non-Parsis in a rare type of ethnic cleansing.”
Yezad Kapadia president, DPA clarifies the entire position:
1. As prescribed by our rules due notice was given for the AGM (annual general meeting) scheduled to be held onSeptember 21st. We had engaged a courier service to distribute the annual report and the proposals to amend our existing rules which were formalized in 1996. There is therefore no question of favoring any particular group amongst our members
2. Although the courier service provider states the documents had been dispatched to all the recipients, we have received complaints that several members had not received the documents. We have had extra copies printed and will hand deliver them as soon as we get them from the printer.
3. The trustees have proposed a few changes, the most contentious one seems to be the sanction to bury non Zoroastrian spouses of our Zoroastrian members in our aramgah. If the Anjuman members do not wish to accept this proposal the trustees cannot force them to do so.
4. Our Dar-e-Meher has, for several decades now, a board at its entrance that (states) only Zoroastrians are allowed to enter.
5. There is absolutely no suggestion in the proposals that we intend to throw those members out of the Anjuman, who do not conform to our way of thinking. This is another example of someone's imagination.
6. No priest has been suspended by the anjuman. [Bagli asserts a suspension notice was served on him following an altercation with the fire temple's chasniwalla (lay assistant) but on the intervention of his aunt, Nergesh Mistry, the letter was withdrawn]