The Indian government has rejected the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF)’s latest report on minorities in the country, sources told CNN-News18 on Thursday.
The USCIRF has issued a detailed statement and again called upon the Joe Biden administration to designate India a Country of Particular Concern, or CPC. It said it is “alarmed by India’s increased transnational targeting of religious minorities and those advocating on their behalf.
The Indian government sources said that the recent election results were a clear example of religious freedom in India. Democratic rights were given even to terror accused and they won Lok Sabha seats, they said.
“USCIRF report is superficial and done on the basis of noise on social media and nothing has been done on the ground,” said a source. “Recent election results of Engineer Rashid and Amritpal Singh are a clear reflection of democratic rights given to Indian minorities. There is no curb and control and the Indian government never tried to reach any mosque or gurdwara to stop these two candidates from contesting elections.”
The only thing that is happening now, according to the sources, is a full crackdown on hatemongers and terror perpetrators.
“State governments are harsh on those who are doing anti-national activities and central agencies are watching those who want to spread terror,” a source said. “We have maximum ISIS busts in the initial planning stage and youths are converted back to normal life with the assurance of parents and these are minorities. The blacklisting of many Indian Sikhs was removed and reviews are going on again and again. We expected this kind of report during elections also and their agenda is also well-known.”
The sources also said that it is absolutely wrong on the part of the organisation to say that the government can’t regulate foreign grants. “In cases of FCRA licence cancellation, they were doing anti-national activities and taking foreign grants only for this purpose,” said a source. “Licence cancellation is always under law scrutiny and agencies have to face the law and without investigations, nothing has been done.”
The sources also said that it was wrong to claim that there were delayed responses to violence by the government. They pointed out that seven-phase polling was carried out recently and it all remained peaceful.
This report is nothing but data crunching and reporting of incidents that happened during the year, they added.
Earlier, official spokesperson of the ministry of external affairs Randhir Jaiswal said, “The US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) is known as a biased organisation with a political agenda. They continue to publish their propaganda on India masquerading as part of an annual report.”
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