Indian priest stabbed in Australia ‘hate crime’

Melbourne, March 20 

In an apparent racist attack, a Catholic priest of Indian heritage was stabbed in the neck at a church in Melbourne by a man who called him unqualified to say mass as he was an Indian.

A man armed with a knife approached Tomy Kalathoor Mathew, 48, in the church foyer moments before the Italian-language mass at St Matthew’s Parish in Fawkner yesterday.

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It is believed that the offender told the priest that because he was Indian, he must be a Hindu or a Muslim and, therefore, unqualified to say mass, the local media reported. — PTI