New Delhi: Reports by the US government on freedom of religion in India lack “credibility” and peddle a “motivated narrative” about the country, said Kirti Vardhan Singh, MoS (Ministry of External Affairs), Thursday.
“Government is aware of reports issued from time to time by various foreign entities, including in the US, about the situation of human rights in India. Such reports are often found to be subjective, misinformed and biased in nature,” said Singh in response to a question in the Rajya Sabha.
The Union minister added: “The US Commission for International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) is an organisation with a political agenda and Government [of India] attaches no credibility to its reports, which misrepresent facts and peddle a motivated narrative about India.”
Singh’s comments come after a report published by USCIRF in October alleged religious freedom in India has collapsed under the government of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
The report by the independent agency set up by the US Congress in 1998 to monitor internationally the freedom of religion in October had mentions of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the inauguration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya and even made note of The Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024.
In May, USCIRF had recommended that India should be placed as a country of particular concern (CPC) due to “discriminatory nationalist policies” of the BJP, disproportionately affecting Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Dalits, Jews and Adivasis.
The Ministry of External Affairs has in the past slammed the reports as “biased” and “motivated”. In June, US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken raised concerns about the increase in hate speeches, as well as anti-conversion laws in India during the launch of the Department of State’s annual religious freedom report. “In India, we see a concerning increase in anti-conversion laws, hate speech, demolitions of homes and places of worship for members of minority faith communities,” he said.
The State Department’s report in June raised issues of persecution of Christians in India and noted that at least 253 churches were burned down in Manipur following outbreak of ethnic violence in the state in May 2023.
“India is a vibrant democracy with its Constitution guaranteeing fundamental rights of citizens, and a robust judiciary and free media ensuring the exercise of these rights,” said Singh in Rajya Sabha Thursday.
Those people in the West would keep harping about decolonisation and native Indians but when it comes to India wiping out signs of colonial plunder, organisations like USCRIF rear is ugly head indulging in duplicitous behaviour. The USCRIF should focus on drawing the attention of the US govt towards rectification of historical wrongs committed against native Indians and the original inhabitants of their lands.