Dozens of angry lay people in Karnataka gathered in front of the Bishop’s House in Mangalore yesterday, accusing the Church of being “unjust and profit-oriented.” “We are fighting for the rights of the people, as the Church is controlled by a few priests,” said Rony Crasta, member of United Christian Association, a lay group. They later gagged themselves with black cloth and held a silent protest. The protesters also accused Mangalore diocese of claiming all the credit for building 160 homes for the poor while having only paid 50 percent of the costs. “This is wrong. The Church should say it helped with the funding. This is one of the issues before us,” said Patrick B D’Sa of the People’s Union for Civil Liberty, which organized the protest. He said the Church should also hand over ownership of the land the houses are built on to the people who are living in them. Father William Menezes, the diocese public relations officer, denied the Church had taken sole credit for the housing project and had freely admitted it put up 50 percent of the costs. He said with regard to land ownership, the Church was simply following the law of the land. The law states that agricultural land ownership has to be transferred to the farmer working the land, while in the case of non-agricultural land, control remains with the owner. “In case of the agricultural land, the Church transferred the ownership to the farmers who were cultivating it. But this law cannot be applied to the non-agricultural land. We need to settle the issue accordingly,” the priest said. The protesters also demanded houses for 13 families, who were recently evicted from Church land by a court order.