For the second year running, an independent bipartisan commission in the United States has recommended to the US government to designate India as a “country of particular concern,” or CPC, for engaging in and tolerating “systematic, ongoing, and egregious religious freedom violations, as defined by the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA)”.

One out of the ten-member panel of United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) commissioners appended a dissenting  note to the recommendations.

In its newly released report, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (UNCIRF) has also asked Washington to “impose targeted sanctions” on individuals and entities responsible for “severe violations of religious freedom” by freezing those individuals’ or entities’ assets “and/or barring their entry into the United States.

 It also recommended that the US government advance human rights of all religious communities in India and promote religious freedom and dignity and interfaith dialogue through bilateral and multilateral forums and agreements, such as the ministerial of the Quadrilateral.

It also recommended that the US “condemn ongoing religious freedom violations and support religious organizations and human rights groups being targeted for their advocacy of religious freedom”.

In its recommendations for the US Congress, the USCIRF said it should “continue to raise religious freedom concerns in the U.S.-India bilateral relationship and highlight concerns through hearings, briefings, letters, and congressional delegations”.

The report claimed that the religious freedom conditions in India continued their “negative trajectory’ in 2020, and accused the BJP led government at the centre of promoting “Hindu nationalist policies resulting in systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom.”

The USCIRF dubbed the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) - a fast track to citizenship for non-Muslim migrants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan residing in India – passed last year as “religiously discriminatory”, and noted that it had led to nationwide protests “and spurred state and nonstate violence, largely targeting Muslims”.

The report also referred to the Delhi riots in February last year and the police decision to clear the "peaceful” anti CAA sit-in in Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh.

The USCIRF described the implementation of  the National Register of Citizens in Assam - where 1.9 million residents were excluded from the citizenship register - a “chilling example” and noted that similar legislation was approved in Madhya Pradesh and was being pushed in several states, including Haryana, Assam, and Karnataka.

The previous Donald Trump administration had last year refused to accept the USCIRF recommendations to designate India as CPC as the body’s recommendations are non-binding.

Johnnie Moore, who gave the dissenting note to the USCIRF recommendations on India, said the country should not be designated a CPC but was at the “crossroads.”

“India’s government and people have everything to gain and absolutely nothing to lose from preserving social harmony and protecting the rights of everyone,” Moore’s note said.

 (SAM)