U.S. Commission Condemns Destruction of Churches and Synagogues in India

Violent Hindu extremists should face sanctions and be barred from the U.S. says U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom

(Photo: A church destroyed in Manipur, India, 2023. Courtesy: Catholic News Agency.)

May 24, 2024

The United States government should designate India as a “country of particular concern” for engaging in “systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom,” a U.S. government commission states in its 2024 Annual Report, which was released earlier this month.

The U.S government should “Impose targeted sanctions on individuals and entities responsible for severe violations of religious freedom by freezing those individuals’ assets and/or barring their entry into the United States under human rights-related financial and visa authorities, citing specific religious freedom violations” the report added.

The report was prepared by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government agency.

China, Russia, Pakistan, North Korea, and Afghanistan are among the 16 countries, besides India, which the USCIRF asked the U.S. government to designate as Countries of Particular Concern. The governments in these countries, the commission noted, engaged in or tolerated “particularly severe violations of the right to freedom of religion or belief.”

In 2023, the Indian government, led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), “reinforced discriminatory nationalist policies, perpetuated hateful rhetoric, and failed to address communal violence disproportionately affecting Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Dalits, Jews, and Adivasis (tribals),” the USCIRF report stated.

Use of various punitive laws “resulted in the arbitrary detention, monitoring, and targeting of religious minorities and those advocating on their behalf. Both news media and NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) reporting on religious minorities were subjected to strict monitoring,” the report continued.

Last year, Hindu extremists destroyed several mosques in various parts of India, while the police who were present took no action, according to the USCIRF report. Hindu vigilantes attacked Muslims under the guise of protecting cows from slaughter.

In Haryana’s predominantly Muslim Nuh district, communal violence erupted following a Hindu procession in July 2023, where participants carrying swords chanted anti-Muslim slogans. The violence was in part initiated by “Monu Manesar,” a well-known cow vigilante accused of murdering two Muslim men in January 2023 for allegedly transporting cattle, the USCIRF report states. Manesar, who has been supported by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), publicly called for individuals to participate in the Hindu procession. A Muslim tomb and mosque were torched, resulting in the death of at least seven individuals, including the Imam of the mosque.

The same day, an Indian railway guard killed three Muslim men inside a train to Mumbai. The perpetrator reportedly asked the victims their names, which indicated their religious identity, before killing them.

In 2023, there were reports of 687 incidents of violence against Christians, according to USCIRF. In January 2023, for instance, an estimated 30 Christians were beaten by Hindu mobs in Chhattisgarh, in eastern India, “for refusing to renounce their faith.” Some Christians were detained under various laws against religious conversion, with no evidence. In June 2023, more than 500 churches and two synagogues were destroyed and over 70,000 people displaced during clashes in Manipur State.

In Kashmir, Indian authorities continued to detain and harass journalists, religious leaders, and human rights defenders.

A six-week long national parliamentary elections are currently underway in India. The electoral strategy of the BJP has always been to try to win Hindu votes by demonizing Muslims. The party is an arm of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), a secretive, militant Hindu nationalist organization, whose mission is to make India a Hindu state. RSS and BJP leaders refer to Muslims as infiltrators, illegal migrants who crossed into India from Bangladesh and Pakistan. 

Up until this month, Modi avoided directly attacking Muslims in his election campaigns though he obliquely identified them by referring to their dress and customs.

Earlier this month, at a BJP election rally in the state of Rajasthan, Modi said that if the opposition Congress Party returns to power, it “will gather all your wealth and distribute it among…infiltrators. Do you think your hard-earned money should be given to infiltrators?” Modi also sought to make an emotional appeal to Hindu women: “my mothers and sisters” a Congress government would take your gold and give it to Muslims, he reportedly said.

In 2022, more than 200 retired senior armed forces officers asked Modi and other officials to punish Hindu monks who called for genocide against Muslims.

Retired Admiral Arun Prakash, a Hindu who was former head of the Indian Navy, tweeted, “WHY IS THIS NOT BEING STOPPED? With our Jawans (soldiers) facing enemies on 2 fronts (China and Pakistan), do we want a communal blood-bath, domestic turmoil and international disgrace? Is it difficult to understand that anything which damages national cohesion & unity endangers India’s national security?”

The USCIRF report states that, in 2023, during Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the U.S., he “failed to answer a question about his government’s treatment of religious minorities.”