Kethepally is a village situated by the side of National Highway No 9. This village comes under the civil district of Nalgonda in Andhra Pradesh, India. Kethepally is a Mandal head quarters. Kethepally is under the jurisdiction of Nalgonda catholic diocese which has its head quarters almost 40 km away from this place. Kethepally is about 120 km far from Hydrabad the state capital and 160 km away from Vijayawada another important city of the state.

A Brief description of Kethepally

Kethepally area has one hundred years of Catholic background. Its Christian background is still older. As it is the fact that the first group of catholic believers was formed in Guntur district by the hard and dedicated missionary works of the great Jesuit Missionaries from France. Afterwards they migrated to different parts of the Telungana districts. It is in the year 1902 the Catholics from Guntur district migrated and settled at Kethepaly. The settlers were members of Bhimaram parish. After being under the care of Bhimaram parish for 16 years in the year 1918 a chapel with a thatched roof was built at Kethepally. The missionaries and the parish priest of Bhimaram parish worked had for almost 32 years and in the year 1935 when a sizable catholic population emerged in and around of the centre of Kethepally the church authorities bifurcated it from Bhimaram parish and elevated it into the status of an independent parish. Since then it has grown into a big catholic community. There are more than four thousand Catholics under this parish scattered in to ten villages. There are ten substations under this parish which has also ten catechists, to help the priest to look after the spiritual needs of the people of the sub stations

The Origin of the Vincentian Mission at Kethepally

De Paul School

It was in the year 2001 that the Bishop of Nalgonda Rt. Rev. Govindu Joji invited the Vincentian fathers to his diocese. He requested them to begin an English Medium school and a boarding at Kethepally. The then Provincial Rev. Fr. Jose Aikara and his council decided to take up the request of the bishop and begin a school for the development of catholic children and others of the area.

Accordingly Fr. Vincent Edakkarot was sent to the place as the pioneer. Fr. Vincent came to Nalgonda on 07. 05. 2001. For about one month he stayed in the Bishop house before moving to the parish house at Kethepally on 02. 06. 2001. Fr. Vincent made his stay with the then parish priest Rev. Fr. M. Dhanaraj and began the school in the church campus with 35 students on roll. In the first year the classes were from LKG to I standard.

The next attempt was to secure land for the school. The diocese was very generous to donate 2.5 acres of land and sponsor another 2 acres of land to Vincentian Andhra Society. And the remaining land was purchased by the Vincentians and registered under above mentioned society.

On 23. 03. 2002 the foundation stone was laid for the construction of the school building. And on 23.09. 2002 the building was blessed by the bishop and inaugurated by the then provincial. In the year 2002 Fr. Vincent moved from parish campus to the school campus and the school also was shifted to the new building.

The next step of action was to construct a residence for the priests. And this dream came true by the generous contribution of Arch Diocese of Kolon, Germany in the year 2003. The construction of a boarding house for the students was a felt need of the place and time. Hence a hostel was constructed with the help of Manos Unidas.

The school has now classes from LKG to VI standard with 350 students on roll. There are 12 teaching staff and 3 non teaching staff as the faculty of the school. The school has secured recognition from the state government. The boarding has 73 inmates including 20 girls. For the purpose of transporting more students the management has provided a school bus.

De Paul School is gathering momentum in her growth. With in a short span of time the school has become one of the best and reputed institutions in the locality. All this was possible with the abundant blessings of God, incessant support of the province and hard work of the founder and pioneer missionary Fr. Vincent Edakkarot

Pastoral activity of the Vincentians

The diocese was very generous to entrust to us two sub stations of the Kethepally Parish. These villages are Thugathuruthy and Cherrukapally. They are about 12 km away from the centre. We do visit villages and celebrate mass and other sacraments. Every Sunday Eucharist is celebrated in these villages.

In future we are going to construct a small chapel in the campus. We are also looking one women congregation to construct a separate hostel for the girl students and maintain it.