The international community urged to influence New Delhi “to safeguard the rights of Dalits, Adivasis and religious minorities.”
A new report released on the Capitol Hill on Tuesday has accused the Indian government of  enabling “repression” of minorities and urged the international community “to take cognizance of human rights violations” in the country and influence New Delhi “to take necessary steps to safeguard the rights of Dalits, Adivasis and religious minorities.”
The 2017 India Minority Rights report, published by the Alliance for Justice & Accountability, analyzes the “State of Minority Rights in India†under the BJP-led government, which completes three years in office this week.
The report, endorsed by the Indian American Muslim Council, Dalit American Coalition, Organization of Minorities from India, Two Circles and South Asian Solidarity Initiative, said “India’s diversity and traditional ethos of tolerance has been marred by hostility and hate along caste and religious lines.”
There has been an increase in the number of human rights violation, and deterioration of religious freedom since the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power, it pointed out.
The 64-pages report noted that a number of incidents of extrajudicial killings, terrorism, violence incited by religious supremacists, attacks on minorities and cow protection vigilantism have taken place in the past three years.
“The human rights violations of religious minorities cover a broad spectrum, from illegal detention, torture and fake encounter killings of detainees to open assault against individuals, their sources of livelihood and in many cases their place of worship,” the report read. “Hundreds of Muslims have been arrested on trumped up charges of terrorism, and have spent several years in prison before being finally acquitted.â€
It criticized the state for becoming an enabler of repression and often going to great lengths to defend and normalize the abuse.
“Laws curbing religious conversion, the ban on sale and possession of beef in many states and the curbs placed on NGOs represent the state’s response to forced conversions, the brutal violence of “cow protection†groups and the harassment and intimidation of human rights defenders respectively,†the report said.
Listing several incidents of attacks against the minority communities, such as Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Dalits and Adivasis; it criticized the activities of Hindu Yuva Vahini, Bajrang Dal and also slammed the ruling BJP and RSS for supporting these organizations.
The report called the death of University of Hyderabad student Rohit Vemula an institutional murder and cited the investigative reports about how Hindutva leaders fabricated a myth called Love Jihad.
“While there are countless examples of interfaith harmony among the masses, the relentless demonization of Muslims, Sikhs, and Christians by Hindutva supremacists (who are actually a minority, albeit a powerful one, among the Hindus) has often resulted in mass violence against both communities, often engineered to affect specific outcomes in local or national elections,” it said.
The report added that “Hindu supremacists” have “terrorized the Christian laity and clergy alike, deploying physical attacks, rapes and murders, vandalizing churches and private properties. The Hindu supremacists’ campaign against Christians has made another Indian minority vulnerable: the Adivasi, who are officially called the Scheduled Tribes.”
The Alliance for Justice & Accountability also made several recommendations to the Indian government. Among them, reverse course “on the massive abuses of human rights being carried out both by state and non-state actors”; “Devise a mechanism to prosecute and punish police officers who falsely frame innocent people in terror cases”; “Compensate and rehabilitate the victims of such fraudulent criminal cases”: and “Ensure that the judiciary strictly implements the law’s mandates in cases of national security and terrorism to weed out bogus cases.”
(This post has been updated.)