Randhir Jaiswal, official spokesperson for India’s Ministry of External Affairs, said the report was ‘motivated and biased’.
Consulate General of India in New York / Wikimedia Commons
The USCIRF has recommended that India should be listed as a Country of Particular Concern for ‘engaging in and tolerating systematic, ongoing, and egregious religious freedom violations’.
Christians in India expressed concern after the federal government dismissed a report from a United States agency report which detailed the lack of religious freedom in the country.
In its latest report, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) sought “targeted sanctions” against the Indian government’s intelligence agency the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and the right-wing volunteer paramilitary organisation Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS).
Rejecting the report as “motivated and biased”, Randhir Jaiswal, official spokesperson for the Ministry of External Affairs, said “instead of persisting with selective criticism of India, USCIRF would do well to reflect on the disturbing incidents of vandalism and attacks on Hindu temples in the United States”.
“It was the usual denial by a regime, which desperately wants to sweep the truth under the carpet,” said Fr Cedric Prakash SJ, a rights activist.
The United Christian Forum, an ecumenical, persecution watchdog, has recorded a steady increase in the number of attacks on Christians since the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came into power in 2014.
From 140 incidents in 2014, it increased to 834 in just a decade of their rule in 2024. Up to November last year, there were 706 anti-Christian hate crime incidents recorded, according to its national coordinator A.C. Michael.
The USCIRF is a federal government commission created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. It monitors the universal right to freedom of religion or belief abroad and advises government policy but has no powers itself.
The commission has recommended that the US administration “freeze” the assets of the RAW and RSS, as well as of individuals associated with them. It also called for a bar on their entry into the US.
The group has faced bans in the past, including in 1948 when its member Nathuram Godse assassinated Mahatma Gandhi, during the Emergency period in 1975-77 and for a third time after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992.
A group of 275 retired judges, bureaucrats and military officers also condemned the USCIRF report, terming it “biased” and “off-the-mark.”
The USCIRF report blacklists India and has recommended that it should be listed in the Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) for “engaging in and tolerating systematic, ongoing and egregious religious freedom violations”.
The commission urged the US to link future security assistance and bilateral trade policies with India to improvements in religious freedom. It also said India should allow US government entities to conduct in-country assessments of religious freedom.
Referring to the Freedom of Religion law enacted by 13 states, the commission said these laws not only impose harsher prison sentences but also lead to increased vigilante attacks against minorities.
A.C. Michael said the anti-conversion laws in the state are being implemented in most BJP-ruled states “under pressure from the RSS”.
New state law violates religious freedom rights, say western Indian bishops
