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Father Francis D’Britto, Roman Catholic priest, Marathi writer, and environmentalist who headed the Harit Vasai Sanrakshan Samiti to save the Vasai-Virar region's villages, farms, forests, and fishing grounds from urbanisation, passed away on Thursday. D'Britto, who was 81, had been ill for some time. The funeral was held at the Sacred Heart Church in his village Nandakhal near Vasai.
Father D'Britto, born in a Marathi-speaking Roman Catholic community in Vasai, also called East Indians, edited a community journal called 'Suvarta'. He authored an adaptation of the Bible in modern Marathi. The monumental book, with 1200 pages, is called the 'Subodh Bible'. His 2010 rewriting of the Bible, the first major version of the holy book in the language since a 1924 translation by Pandita Ramabai, was for the benefit of readers who found the archaic Marathi in the old translations of the book, incomprehensible. In 2011, the Archbishop of Bombay, Cardinal Oswald Gracias, presented a copy of the book to Pope Benedict XVI.
Based out of Vasai, an old hub of Catholicism established by Portuguese missionaries in the 16th century, D'Britto was an expert on the new theology movements in the church.
He was also a Tukaram scholar. During the fourth centenary birthday celebrations of the Bhakti poet during 2008-2009, the Maharashtra government appointed him as a member of the fifteen-member committee to advise it on the anniversary celebrations. D'Britto was conferred the Dnyanoba Tukaram Award in 2015.
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He received the 2014 Marathi Sahitya Akademi Award and was the president of the 93rd Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Sahitya Sammelan in January 2020.
Apart from his interests in Christian theology and Tukaram studies, D'Britto was closely involved in the campaign against the environmental threat to the Vasai-Virar region posed by the expansion of suburban Mumbai. In the 1980s, residents of the villages in the region started a campaign to stop the state government from appointing The City and Industrial Development Corporation (Cidco) of Maharashtra, as the planning agency to convert the agricultural area into planned towns with a projected population of 25 lakh. D'Britto and his Harit Vasai Sanrakshan Samiti were at the forefront of these protests. Facing fierce opposition from the residents, the state government restricted development to 1.5 kilometres on both sides of the railway line, thus sparing the western part of the region from reckless urbanisation.
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Noel Dabre, an advocate from Vasai who was active in the movement, said, "The greenery that you see now is because of the movement. The development plan was changed and villages were excluded from the urbanisation plans."
His funeral at the Nandakhal church on a rainy evening brought nearly 3000 people. "The atmosphere was heavy. We lost a great soul," said Dabre.
An admirer of the priest wrote on social media: Your unwavering dedication and relentless advocacy to preserve the greenbelt of Vasai-Virar has left an indelible mark on our community. Your courageous stand against the forces that sought to exploit the Vasai-Virar area has not only protected our environment but also inspired countless individuals to join the cause. Through your powerful speeches and eloquent writings, you galvanised the Holy People of God, uniting us in a common mission to safeguard our precious land for future generations.
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