The US government said its officials have engaged with Indian officials, members of parliament, and politicians from multiple political parties “to emphasise the importance of religious freedom and the responsibility of democracies to ensure the rights of religious minorities”
Waquar Hasan | Clarion India
NEW DELHI — Attacks on India’s religious minorities, including killings, assaults, and intimidation, in the name of cow protection, conversion, interfaith relationship and communal violence occurred throughout last year, said the International Religious Freedom report released by the US administration on Monday.
The State Department’s 2022 report dwells at length on India’s human rights violations against religious minorities. The report raised issues of house demolitions by the administration, police atrocities, arrest of minorities over conversion, the continued hijab ban in Karnataka colleges, hate speeches, discriminatory policies and draconian laws.
“There were numerous reports during the year of violence by law enforcement authorities against members of religious minorities in multiple states, including plainclothes police in Gujarat publicly flogging four Muslim men accused of injuring Hindu worshippers during a festival in October, and the Madhya Pradesh state government bulldozing Muslim-owned homes and shops following communal violence in Khargone in April,” noted the report.
According to the report, there were also cases of communal violence between religious groups. The National Crimes Record Bureau reported 378 instances of communal violence in 2021 (most recent data) compared to 857 in 2020. Religious leaders, academics, political figures, and activists were also accused of making inflammatory public remarks against religious minorities.
Illustrating the examples of inflammatory remarks against the minorities, the report noted that Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati, described as a Hindu religious extremist, urging Hindus to “take up arms” against the threat of religious conversion and Muslim rule in the country; BJP state politician Haribhushan Thakur Bachaul, who said that Muslims should be “set ablaze”; P.C. George, a former legislator in Kerala state, who encouraged Hindus and Christians to not eat at restaurants run by Muslims; and BJP’s former Rajasthan legislator Gyan Dev Ahuja, who encouraged Hindus to kill Muslims suspected of cow slaughter.
The US government said its embassy and consulate officials, including the Chargés d’Affaires, have engaged with Indian officials, members of parliament, and politicians from multiple political parties “to emphasise the importance of religious freedom and the responsibility of democracies to ensure the rights of religious minorities”.
Embassy and consulate officials and visiting senior officials from Washington also met with representatives of religious minorities, NGOs, civil society members, academics, and interfaith leaders to discuss the importance of religious freedom and pluralism, the value of interfaith dialogue, and the operating environment for faith-based NGOs.
The Assistant Secretary of State and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs also engaged with civil society representatives for their perspectives on religious freedom challenges within the country and with government officials to underscore the importance of respecting human rights, including religious freedom.
During an interaction with media persons on Monday, a senior US official said that the US administration has urged the Indian government to condemn violence and hold accountable those perpetuating crimes against religious minorities.
“We’ll continue to speak directly with our colleagues and counterparts in India regarding these concerns. We’re continuing to encourage the government to condemn violence and hold accountable and protect all groups who engage in rhetoric that’s dehumanising towards religious minorities and all groups who engage in violence against religious communities and other communities in India,” said the US official.
The official stated that the international community, including human rights organisations, has drawn significant attention to the situation in India. The US Holocaust Museum continues to draw considerable attention to the human rights situation in India and lists it as one of the top countries of concern with regard to the potential for mass killings there. “So we’ll continue to work very closely with our civil society colleagues on the ground, with courageous journalists that are working every day to document some of these abuses, and we’ll continue speaking directly with our counterparts in India to address these issues,” said the official.
According to the report, 13 of the country’s 28 states – Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana (as of March), Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka (as of September), Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh – have laws restricting religious conversion.