NEW YORK, Apr 28 (APP): A U.S. federal government commission on international religious freedom has lambasted India for the sharp decline in religious freedom condition in the country, saying Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has allowed “campaigns of harassment and violence” against Muslims and other religious minorities.
“Following the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) re-election in May (2019), the national government used its strengthened parliamentary majority to institute national level policies violating religious freedom across India, especially for Muslims,” the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), said in a damning report released in Washington, DC, on Tuesday.
(USCIRF) is entrusted with monitoring religious freedom abroad. USCIRF, and the State Department is required to consider them.
The commission recommended that the State Department designate India as a “country of particular concern,” or CPC, said Nadine Maenza, its vice chairperson, because it “tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom.” The most “startling and disturbing,” she said, was India’s passage of a citizenship amendment act that fast-tracks citizenship for newcomers who belong to six religions but excludes Muslims.
“This potentially exposes millions of Muslims to detention, deportation and statelessness when the government completes its plan for a nationwide, national register,” she said.
India was last recommended for the CPC designation in 2004 (as well as for the years 2001-2003) for similar issues – Hindu leadership failing to address or allying itself with anti-minority sentiments or actions. The 2004 USCIRF report says violence “against Muslims and Christians continues.”
The report also said that India’s annexation of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019 and the military lockdown of the disputed region “negatively impacted religious freedom”.
USCIRF, the US government watchdog body, said in the report said, “In 2019, religious freedom conditions in India experienced a drastic turn downward, with religious minorities under increasing assault,” adding that the BJP government “allowed violence against minorities and their houses of worship to continue with impunity, and also engaged in and tolerated hate speech and incitement to violence.
“Significantly, the BJP-led government enacted the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA)—a fast track to citizenship for non-Muslim migrants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan already residing in India—and approved a National Population Register (NPR) as a first step toward a nation-wide National Register of Citizens (NRC).
“The border state of Assam, under mandate of the Supreme Court, implemented a statewide NRC to identify illegal migrants within Assam. When the statewide NRC was released in August, 1.9 million residents—both Muslims and Hindus—were excluded. Those excluded live in fear of the consequences: three United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteurs warned that exclusion from the NRC could result in ‘statelessness, deportation, or prolonged detention’.
“Indeed, Home Minister Amit Shah referred to migrants as “termites” to be eradicated. Troubled that Hindus were excluded from Assam’s NRC, he and other BJP officials advocated for the CAA as a corrective measure to protect Hindus.
“The CAA provides listed non-Muslim religious communities a path to restore their citizenship and avoid detention or deportation. In its wake, the BJP leaders have continued to advocate for a nation-wide NRC; the citizenship of millions would be placed under question, but, with the CAA in place, Muslims alone would bear the indignities and consequences of potential statelessness.
“The CAA’s passage in December sparked nationwide protests that police and government-aligned groups met with violence; in Uttar Pradesh (UP), the BJP chief minister Yogi Adityanath pledged ‘revenge’ against anti-CAA protestors and stated they should be fed ‘bullets not biryani.’
“In December, close to 25 people died in attacks against protestors and universities in UP alone. According to reports, police action specifically targeted Muslims. Throughout 2019, government action—including the CAA, continued enforcement of cow slaughter and anti-conversion laws, and the November Supreme Court ruling on the Babri Masjid site—created a culture of impunity for nationwide campaigns of harassment and violence against religious minorities….
“Mob lynchings of persons suspected of cow slaughter or consuming beef continued, with most attacks occurring within BJP-ruled states. Lynch mobs often took on overtly Hindu nationalist tones. In June, in Jharkand, a mob attacked a Muslim, Tabrez Ansari, forcing him to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram (Hail Lord Ram)’ as they beat him to death.
“Police often arrest those attacked for cow slaughter or conversion activities rather than the perpetrators. Violence against Christians also increased, with at least 328 violent incidents, often under accusations of forced conversions. These attacks frequently targeted prayer services and led to the widespread shuttering or destruction of churches. In 2018, the Supreme Court urged the central and state governments to combat lynchings with stricter laws.
“When, by July 2019, the central government and 10 states had failed to take appropriate action, the Supreme Court again directed them to do so. Rather than comply, Home Minister Shah called existing laws sufficient and denied lynchings had increased, while the Home Ministry instructed the National Crime Records Bureau to omit lynchings from the 2019 crime data report.
“During 2019, discriminatory policies, inflammatory rhetoric, and tolerance for violence against minorities at the national, state, and local level increased the climate of fear among non-Hindu communities. After the reporting period, India continued on this negative trajectory. In February 2020, three days of violence erupted in Delhi with mobs attacking Muslim neighborhoods. There were reports of Delhi police, operating under the Home Ministry’s authority, failing to halt attacks and even directly participating in the violence. At least 50 people were killed.”
About the situation in Indian occupied Kashmir, the report said, that In August 2019, the government stripped Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir’s autonomy and imposed security measures, including restricting freedom of movement and assembly, cutting Internet and phone access, and arresting Kashmiri leaders, including religious leaders.
“The restrictions on movement and assembly limited the ability to attend prayers and religious ceremonies,” it said. “USCIRF also received several reports of mosques being closed, imams and Muslim leaders arrested and detained, and threats and violence by extremist groups.’
Although Pakistan has been re-designated as a CPC, however, the report acknowledged a number of positive developments in Pakistan including opening of the Kartarpur Corridor, opening of Pakistan’s first Sikh university, the reopening of a Hindu temple, acquittal of Asia Bibi and a few others by Supreme Court on blasphemy charges, and the government’s steps to revise educational material with discriminatory content against religious minorities.
Despite criticism of some actions in Pakistan, The report said, ” There were positive developments in 2019, such as the opening of the Kartarpur Corridor with India, allowing Sikh pilgrims to visit the Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan’s Punjab Province; Prime Minister Imran Khan laying the foundation stone of Pakistan’s first Sikh university; and the reopening and renovation of a Hindu temple in Sialkot.”
