Jonathan Harley travelled to Calcutta to investigate.

Missionaries of Charity

Music

Harley: Mother Teresa's sisters are up well rise well before dawn to answer their calling. It's a life dedicated to prayer, service and simple living, a way of life not unfamiliar to any of these women who come from poor village backgrounds.

00:00

Sisters in orphanage

But the world's most famous charity is facing a lost of trust among the very people it's vowed to save. For all their devotion to helping the poor and needy, the Missionaries of Charity are under renewed scrutiny over their financial accountability and quality of care.

00:30

More seriously Mother Teresa's missionaries are facing criminal charges of child abuse.

Kids at orphanage with overseas carers

Some of these babies have been abandoned at birth by single mothers, others because they are mentally or physically disabled.

01:01

Many of their carers are volunteers from overseas. Compassionate tourists often with little or no nursing experience.

Debra Williams has been working here for nearly a month.

Debra in orphanage

Williams: I wanted to work with children and I worked with children with disabilities before and they really desperately need people here so it was a simple choice really, and after I'd spent the first day I loved it.

01:05

Harley: But it wasn't long before deep reservation set in.

Williams: I've seen smacking, I've seen slapping, yanking around of babies by their arms, making their heads wobble, and I'm quite concerned sometimes as well that children get overlooked at feeding, because there is no actual system or routine. It's just a case of putting food in the nearest baby and I'm sure kids get overlooked.

01:41

Sisters and carers in orphanage

Harley: And Debra's not the only volunteer who complained to us about neglect. Concerns include strapping sick children into their cots with no proper medical attention. For the likes of Debra the Missionaries of Charity aren't making the most of the millions of dollars sent from all over the world.

02:02

Williams: What worries me is that they, like I say, they have a monopoly on people's goodwill from abroad, so they're getting an enormous amount of donations,

02:20

they get an enormous of volunteer help and I think there are other organisations that aren't as well publicised that could really benefit.

02:26

Woman at water pump

Harley: Debra's worries are matched by those with far more experience in how Mother Teresa's followers work.

02:36

Preger and Harley

Preger: He's an old patient. So he's got the lesions here, see he's got the claw hand …

02:41

Harley: Dr Jack Preger heads “Calcutta Rescue” – providing yet more of the city’s poor with free medical and education services.

02:46

Preger at school

His is a thread-bare operation, the leprosy clinic is a squat on the banks of Calcutta's river Hoogly. He’s worked with the Missionaries of Charity in both Bangladesh and India. But left because he wasn’t happy with their medical standards.

Preger: It's like run on the style of the British poor houses two hundred years ago.

03:00

Preger/orphanage

A great deal more should have been done in terms of modern medical care. The defence always was, we are not a medical order. But if you are involved with sick people and you're not a medical order, you should bring in people who are and that they didn't really accept.

03:25

Harley: Medically speaking are the Missionaries of Charity out of their depth?

03:45

Preger: They are but they don’t realise it because they are going to carry on Mother's theories, Mother's teachings.

Sister Nirmala

Sister Nirmala: You see we are not hospitals. No, we are homes. So we give simple medicines to people.

03:58

Harley and Sister Nirmala

Harley: Sister Nirmala is the woman with the responsibility of carrying on Mother's theories and teachings. She couldn’t be more different from her charismatic, media-savvy mentor. Just months before Mother Teresa died, she anointed Sister Nirmala Superior General of the Missionaries of Charity.

04:06

Shy of the spot-light, she rarely gives interviews. But Sister Nirmala’s standing firm against growing pressures to reassess the way Mother did business.

04:26

Sister Nirmala

Sister Nirmala: All her life she spoke to us, and she has given us the way of life to follow, she is praying for us, and whenever I turn to her to ask her things, she inspires, the same as it was. The same as it was when Mother was there, same, same, same, yeah. Nothing new.

04:36

Candle

Music

04:57

Harley: The missionaries steadfast conviction that they are carrying out God's will means their ways have changed little in half a century.

For this order with its strict oath of obedience – Mother Teresa's methods are cast in stone. But the Missionaries of Charity are not just accused of being old-fashioned in their quality of care. There are also serious charges of criminal malpractice.

Kabiran working with family

Kabiran Mondal works in a Calcutta slum as a rag picker. He collects and sorts scraps of string and paper, seven days a week. Kabiran makes just $1.50 a day and on this he and his wife keep a family of five.

05:34

He asked the Missionaries of Charity to educate his children and to look after them in their boarding home.

05:51

Kabiran: If they live at the monastery it is good for us. I cannot get enough for my own expenses --

05:58

Kabiran

after all, we have our food and other expenses – and there are many other expenses. And our income is not enough for all that.

06:04

Kabiran's children

Harley: Last September his seven year old daughter Karobi was suspected of stealing money, along with three classmates. The punishment was as extreme as it was premeditated.

06:18

Sister Francesca, one of the most senior figures in the Missionaries of Charity, heated a knife on a kitchen hot plate and pressed its burning flat surface on the back of Karobi's hand. This punishment was repeated with the other three girls.

06:31

Karobi

Karobi: When Sister put the knife on me I wasn't sure what was happening but soon I realised I'd been stabbed with a burning knife and then I felt the pain and I started crying. After that we all started crying and screaming and the Sister said If you don't keep quiet, I'm going to burn you again. So everyone kept quiet… and after that the Sister came along with some coconut oil and rubbed it on, and things got better. After that she cut the skin off with a knife and gave us some medicine.

06:48

Harley and Sister Nirmala

Harley: Sister Nirmala’s admitted to the charges but says the incident was the work of God.

07:27

Sister Nirmala: Yeah, this is a human fault, human frailty. It has been embarrassing. At the same time, we accept it as God's goodness to us, you know, to remind us remember who you are serving and we keep going.

07:33

Harley: What sort of comfort is that to the children who have been abused?

07:55

Sister Nirmala: The sister when she did it, she did it as a corrective measure though she was not right. But the children know Sister's love and they have not stopped loving those children, caring for those, we have not stopped any work, we are going ahead.

07:58

Harley and Kabiran

Harley: It’s not quite the family’s story. Karobi’s father says their children have been banished by the sisters from their boarding home.

08:15

Kabiran

Kabiran: Yes, they've told me – There's no need for you to keep your children here any more. They can stay in their own homes and you can take care of their education. The children have been told they must stay with their parents. All the other children who were there and who have their own parents have been evicted. They've been evicted because of this incident. Many of those who were under that Sister have been sent to boarding school, and other schools.

08:23

Kabiran eating

Harley: It was a big decision for someone in Kabiran’s position to take on the Missionaries of Charity. The police were reluctant to file such sensitive charges.

08:59

But Kabiran was persuaded to press on with the action, supported by many who believe it highlights a wider problem.

Kabiran: We live in this area, and if we do not do it

09:17

Kabiran

there'll be pressure from people who'll say If you don't do it you won't be able to live here… They have done this to your child. But we were worried that if we did it the Sisters would send us packing and my children would miss out – deprived of education for life.

09:21

Harley: Are your children disadvantaged for the action that you are taking?

Kabiran: Yes, I know in my heart that my children will now stay illiterate. They will stay with me and whatever little knowledge I have, I'll pass on to them -- and in the coming times, I'll try to teach them some craft.

09:45

Their mother also knows a few things, so together we will teach them. And after that whatever happens is in the hands of God.

10:00

Harley: Was it a breach of trust?

10:11

Sister Nirmala

Sister Nirmala: Yes, the sister failed, but somehow I think people are still trusting. People know that we are human beings, we can fail but we can always say sorry and go ahead.

10:13

Exterior of Missionaries of Charity building

Harley: But there is no talk of counselling or compensation for the children from this multi-million dollar order.

10:30

The Mondal's experience received widespread publicity in Calcutta. The trial has raised further questions about the accountability of the Missionaries of Charity. Among them, the recurring criticism that the missionaries accept money from anywhere, whatever its colour.

10:42

File footage with super:

Port Au Prince, Haiti

For many years, Mother Teresa was infamous for accepting stolen money from dictators and criminal businessmen.

11:00

In the 1990s the key fraudster in America’s savings and loans scandal – Charles Keating - gave 1.25 million US dollars of stolen money to Mother Teresa. When he and his savings scheme went bust -- lawyers called on her to return the stolen money.

11:08

Sister Nirmala

Sister Nirmala: You see, why Mother did not return that money I cannot tell, she must be having a reason for that.

11:28

Harley: Was it the right thing to do?

Sister Nirmala: I cannot tell that because why she did it, I have no explanation.

Harley: It’s not as the though the missionaries can’t afford to return the money. The charity is one of the world’s biggest.

11:45

Harley: Do you know how much money you have in the Missionaries of Charity?

11:51

Sister Nirmala: Countless, countless.

Harley: So you are not sure what the figure is?

Sister Nirmala: Oh no, it's a vast organisation, no?

12:03

Harley: Does anybody know?

Sister Nirmala: Nobody knows, God knows.

Harley: So it's God's maths?

Sister Nirmala: Yes. It is he the banker, he supplies. See today, maybe we have very little, but the next moment, there’ll be another one big donation will come, you know. It is difficult in a sense to keep on counting all the time, although it is counted, it is difficult to give all the money we have got, only god knows, you can ask him.

12:12

Sunita Kumar at home

Harley: But the only person besides God who may know is Sunita Kumar, the queen of Calcutta's social set. A close friend of 30 years, it was Sunita Kumar who first announced to the world that Mother Teresa had died. And such is her influence she’s still the missionaries' unofficial spokesperson, second only to sister Nirmala herself.

12:33

Harley: Shouldn't one of the world's most famous charities be financially accountable?

12:57

Sunita Kuma

Sunita Kumar: I don’t think you need any sort of accounts on paper to try and show or for the Missionaries of Charity to prove that everything is being utilised in the right direction, because that's why people give because they are sure of one thing, that it's not being misused.

13:03

Sister with children

Harley: But in today's world of fiscal responsibility such assurances may not be as comforting as they once were. Whether it is quality of care or financial transparency, the Missionaries of Charity are facing controversy. But it's not affecting the saintly reputation of Mother Teresa. Ironically her spiritual stature appears to be growing. So much so that her elevation to sainthood seems inevitable.

13:25

The church can't afford for it to be otherwise.

Archbishop De Souza

De Souza: she certainly has been one of the greatest evangelisers for the Catholic church in the world and in a particular way for us here in India.

13:58

Church service

Singing

Harley: The archbishop of Calcutta, Henry De Souza has been assisting the beatification commission. It's so far recorded 115 interviews and received several hundred written submissions in support of Mother Teresa's canonisation.

14:14

De Souza

Harley: Is she a saint?

14:31

De Souza: Well, I think so. I believe that she is in the hearts of most people a saint. The people in the city , those on the street, if you ask them about Mother Teresa, they will say we don't need a canonisation, she is a saint!

Interior of hospice

Harley: But at Mother Teresa's original hospice for the dying and destitute, little has changed in half a century. For all their resources and notoriety, there are those who warn that Mother Teresa's fast track to sainthood won't improve the way the missionaries work.

14:54

Jack Preger: The scale of their work is miraculous. I mean there is all kinds of saints in the history of the church but what she achieved from nothing is, I'm convinced, the work of the Holy Spirit.

15:14

Preger

The mistake is to imagine that if you get this push on the Holy Spirit that you will wake up every day with a menu or a program from the Holy Spirit and you can't do anything wrong. So that there is a possibility of making serious mistakes even though the origin of the work I believe comes from God.

15:29

Inside hospice

Music

Harley: Mother Teresa could be made a saint within the next few years. In the meantime, her order must answer demands to provide better care and attention, as well as greater accountability and transparency.

15:59

At stake is not just Mother Teresa’s memory – but how the Missionaries of Charity carry on her work to serve the poorest of the poor.

16:30

Credits:

Reporter: John Harley

Camera: Michael Cox

Editor: Stuart Miller

Producer: Tony Chapman