ICC Note: A United Nations report has linked India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with violence and hate speech against religious minorities. Since taking control of India’s government in 2014, the BJP has overseen an administration that tolerated, and at times encouraged, a rise in religious intolerance. In 2017 alone, Christians in India documented over 350 attacks on their community by Hindu radicals.
09/14/2018 India (UCAN) – A new United Nations report has linked India’s pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with violence and inflammatory speeches against religious minorities.
U.N. special rapporteur Tendayi Achiume, an independent human rights expert appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council, on Sept. 12 submitted a report on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP, which took power in New Delhi in 2014, “has been linked to incidents of violence against members of Dalit, Muslim, tribal and Christian communities,” the report said.
It said reports have documented the “use of inflammatory remarks by BJP leaders against minority groups” and the “rise of vigilantism targeting Muslims and Dalits” in India.
The report mandated by a 2017 U.N. General Assembly resolution aimed to analyze “threats posed by nationalist populism to the fundamental human rights principles of non-discrimination and equality.”
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