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India dismisses US religious freedom report criticizing Modi govt

Certain BJP members have affiliations with Hindu extremist groups, report says
India dismisses US religious freedom report criticizing Modi govt

A file image of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi taken on June 14. (Photo by Vyacheslav Oseledko/AFP)

Published: June 24, 2019 09:51 AM GMT
Updated: June 24, 2019 09:57 AM GMT

India has denied claims made in a U.S. religious freedom report that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has failed to contain violence targeting non-Hindus in the country.

The annual International Religious Freedom Report released June 21 said that religious freedom conditions in India continued a downward trend in 2018.

“Exclusionary extremist narratives” increased in recent years “including, at times, the government’s allowance and encouragement of mob violence against religious minorities that have facilitated an egregious and ongoing campaign of violence, intimidation and harassment against non-Hindu and lower-caste Hindu minorities,” the report said.

A third of India’s 29 state governments last year increasingly enforced laws against conversion and cow slaughter “discriminatorily against non-Hindus and Dalits alike,” it said.

“Mob violence was also carried out against Christians under accusations of forced or induced religious conversion,” it noted.

The report said cow protection mobs engaged in violence predominantly targeting Muslims and Dalits, some of whom have been legally involved in the dairy, leather or beef trades for generations, the report said.

Modi “seldom made statements decrying mob violence, and certain members of his political party have affiliations with Hindu extremist groups and used inflammatory language about religious minorities publicly,” it said.

Raveesh Kumar, spokesman of the External Affairs Ministry, rejected the report’s findings.

"We see no locus standi for a foreign entity or government to pronounce on the state of our citizens’ constitutionally protected rights," Kumar said June 23.

"India is proud of its secular credentials, its status as the largest democracy and a pluralistic society with a longstanding commitment to tolerance and inclusion.” 

Modi’s pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) also responded publicly to the report.

"The basic presumption in this report, that there is some grand design behind anti-minority violence, is simply false,” said Anil Baluni, a BJP parliamentarian.

Baluni said most of the violence that the report refers to stems from local disputes or criminal activity.

"Whenever needed, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other BJP leaders have strongly deplored violence against minorities and weaker sections of society," Baluni said.

Hindu groups who support the BJP want to turn India into a Hindu-only nation, an agenda that some allege the BJP is sympathetic towards.

India’s dismissal of the report comes at a time when U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is scheduled to arrive in India on a three-day visit beginning June 25.

Pompeo's visit is also seen as a precursor to Modi's visit to Japan for the June-25-28 G20 Summit, where he is to hold bilateral talks with President Donald Trump.

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