NEW DELHI: India on Thursday rejected the US Fee on Worldwide Spiritual Freedom (USCIRF) report, calling the physique “a biased organisation with political agenda“.
Sharing New Delhi’s tackle the report, the ministry of exterior affairs spokesperson, Randhir Jaiswal, mentioned the USCIRF “continues to misrepresent details and peddles a motivated narrative about India”.
“Our views on the USA Fee on Worldwide Spiritual Freedom (USCIRF) are well-known. It’s a biased group with a political agenda. It continues to misrepresent details and peddles a motivated narrative about India. We reject this malicious report, which solely serves to discredit USCIRF additional,” Jaiswal mentioned.
He additional mentioned: “We might urge USCIRF to desist from such agenda pushed efforts. The USCIRF would even be effectively suggested to utilise its time extra productively on addressing human rights points in the USA.”
The US federal authorities fee had flagged the alleged worsening of spiritual freedom in India and known as for it to be designated as a “Nation of Specific Concern“.
“This report highlights how, all through 2024, people have been killed, overwhelmed, and lynched by vigilante teams, non secular leaders have been arbitrarily arrested, and houses and locations of worship have been demolished. These occasions represent notably extreme violations of spiritual freedom,” the USCIRF mentioned.
Starting with the earlier Manmohan Singh-led UPA authorities, India has persistently denied visas to USCIRF members to go to the nation, citing “interference” in its inner affairs, it added.
India and several other Indian-American teams have prior to now accused the USCIRF of biased, unscientific and agenda-driven reporting to malign the nation.
“It (the report) additional describes adjustments to and enforcement of India’s authorized framework to focus on and disenfranchise non secular minorities, together with the Citizenship Modification Act, a uniform civil code, and several other state-level anti-conversion and cow slaughter legal guidelines,” the USCIRF mentioned.
