Sister Guadalupe passes away at age 97
TURA: The Spanish nun who made Garo Hills her home and worked tirelessly for over 65 years with the lepers is no more.
Rev. Sister Guadalupe Velasco of the Catholic congregation Missionaries of Christ Jesus passed away at Nazareth Hospital in Shillong at 12:40 AM of Wednesday. She was 97.
A requiem mass is taking place at Nirmali Convent in Shillong today at 1 O’clock Wednesday afternoon and shortly after her mortal remains will be brought to Tura where she will lie in state at St. Xavier’s school and convent, a place she made her home for over six decades.
Her funeral will take place at the Cathedral Church in Tura on Thursday at 3 PM and she will be laid to rest at the Catholic cemetery adjacent to the Bishop House.
Often considered the Mother Teresa of Garo Hills, her dedication to the people of the region despite being a “foreigner” made her one of the most revered persons in Meghalaya.
Sister Guadalupe, who came to the region when she was a young Spanish nun, spent around seven decades of her life here to serve the lepers who were rejected as the scum of the society.
During her diamond jubilee celebrations in Tura, seven years ago, she interacted with The Shillong Times recalling a time when the leper colony was the ostracised part of the town and none would allay the sufferings of the patients.
Sister Guadalupe was moved by their plight and loneliness and decided to settle down in Tura, never to go back. Over the years she became an inspiration for many to work for the downtrodden with equal dedication.
“When I first went to the colony I was moved to see so many patients suffering from the disease. There were as many as 75 lepers with wounds all over their bodies. Our day began early morning and sometimes stretched into the late evening hours,” recalled Sr. Guadalupe in an earlier interaction with this scribe during her diamond jubilee celebrations at Tura.
Many of the patients had been brought to the colony by their families and abandoned.
Those were extremely difficult times for the missionaries in Garo Hills in terms of both manpower and resources. There were only two other helpers to assist Sister Guadalupe in her work with the leper patients.
“Every day we would clean and dress the wounds of 75 patients. Some were unable to even move so we gave them a bath and fed them too. We frequently faced scarcity of bandages for the dressings. So we use to cut our extra clothes we carried to the colony and use them as bandages because we had to clean the wounds every day,” recalled Sr. Guadalupe.
She would continue her work for the next six decades seldom taking even a day’s break from the colony.
“There were times when we use to find her exhausted with fatigue and we would try to make her stay back at the convent to rest but she would refuse. She would worry as to who would take care of her patients at the colony and after taking a light meal in the daytime return to her work,” recalls Sister Elizabeth, who has worked closely with Sr. Guadalupe.
“Loneliness is very heavy for those who are left behind by their families. Even after they are cured they were not taken back. It is very sad. We try and make them feel at home,” said Sr. Guadalupe.
Her simplicity and willingness to reach out to each and every one has created a bonding amongst the inhabitants of the colony. Today they help one another in all spheres of their daily activities.
“If someone passes away in the colony everyone comes forward to help. They themselves make the coffin, dig the grave, make the wreaths and arrange for tea and snacks. There is a sense of belonging among them,” Sister Guadalupe would narrate the close family bonding among the lepers.
Leprosy is now a curable disease with hardly any new cases but there are as many as 45 former patients who have lost their limbs to the disease and have nowhere to go having been abandoned by their families.
Social stigma has been associated with leprosy for much of history and even in today’s world continues to be a barrier.
Despite losing their limbs and inability to do any work, the government does not provide them with any support since they have been cured and are no longer looked upon as patients.
Help continued to be extended to them by Sr. Guadalupe who would provide them regular supply of rice, dal and cooking oil for the last ten years after rallying donors from abroad who regularly send funds for their care.
One such donor is none other than the younger sister of Guadalupe who even after retiring from service many years ago continues to send her monthly pension for the leper colony.
The decades of hard work and the support given by friends and well-wishers of Sr Guadalupe has helped to transform the lives of the lepers at the colony. Today they successfully cultivate pineapples in a big way and their produce is the most sought after not just in Garo Hills but beyond Assam as well.
“With the earnings from the pineapple cultivation they are able to purchase their requirements and also repair their thatched dwelling houses once a year,” pointed out Sr Guadalupe in her interview.
There is also a primary school successfully running in the colony and some of the children whose parents suffered from the disease have achieved success in life.
“One of the children has completed his medical, another nursing and there are others who have gone on to complete their post-graduation despite so many difficulties they faced,” remembered a happy Sr Guadalupe.
“I love them, which is why I stayed on. I never had any regrets and I will never leave the colony,” she would go on to say.
For the lepers and their families she was the ‘lady with the lamp’ and her undaunted spirit, even at her age, brought hope to the dejected.
