Diocese of Salem

The Diocese of Salem, comprising the civil districts of Salem and Namakkal, traces its Christian roots to 1623 when Southern Kongunadu embraced the faith through Fr. Robert De Nobili, S.J., followed by Portuguese Jesuits of the Madurai Mission and later Italian Jesuits of the Mysore Mission. Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, missionaries such as Fr. De Cunha and Msgr. Champenois, who was the first bishop to visit Salem, worked to sustain the mission amid political upheavals, with significant restoration efforts by Fr. Abbe Dubois after devastation under Tippu Sultan. After phases of jurisdictional changes—from the Cranganore Kartenaras (1797–1833), to the Coromandel Mission, and then the Vicariate Apostolic of Pondicherry—the region remained under Pondicherry until 1930, except for areas temporarily attached to Mysore and Kumbakonam. The Diocese of Salem was finally erected on 26 May 1930, drawing parishes from Pondicherry, Kumbakonam, Mysore, and later Mettur, and in 1949 it received its first Indian bishop, Rt. Rev. V. S. Selvanather. In 1997, the diocese was bifurcated, leading to the creation of the Diocese of Dharmapuri with Msgr. Joseph Antony Irudaya Raj, SDB, appointed as its first bishop.