Justice For All Gravely Disappointed On Non-Designation Of India As A Country Of Particular Concern

Justice for All is gravely disappointed that the State Department has failed to designate India as a “country of particular concern” (CPC) for its lack of religious freedoms this year.

The United States Commission for International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has for two consecutive years seen fit to recommend that India be designated as a CPC because of the country’s lack of religious freedoms and its continued persecution of minorities.

Justice For All had welcomed the State Department’s 2021 report on International Religious Freedoms in which it documented India’s gross human rights violations faced by minority communities particularly Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, and Dalits.

Given India’s worsening egregious human rights violations of religious minorities and the drastic downward trajectory in 2021 towards a majoritarian and Hindu centric nation, one would have expected the State Department to designate India as a CPC.

The designation of India as a CPC would have served notice to the Indian government to rectify its disturbing discriminatory trajectory against religious minorities. Discriminatory legislation like the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), Love Jihad (Anti Conversion) laws as well as human rights violations against CAA and farmers’ laws protesters have amply demonstrated the Modi government’s disregard of secular democratic principles.

In the meantime mob violence, beef lynchings, desecration of places of worship, and the like will continue in India.