Will Trump govt use US religious freedom report to further pressure India into submission?

By Rajiv Shah 

Already under pressure from the Trump administration, which has reportedly asked India—successfully, some would say—to remove high tariffs on American products, there is reason to wonder whether Washington might use the recommendations of the latest United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) Annual Report to further act against the Government of India.

A US federal government commission created by the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA) of 1998, USCIRF commissioners may be appointed by the President and the leadership of both political parties in the Senate and the House of Representatives. However, it is a recommendatory body whose principal responsibilities include reviewing the facts and circumstances of violations of religious freedom internationally and offering policy changes.

While the Government of India has called the USCIRF report "biased and politically motivated," accusing it of "misrepresenting isolated incidents and casting aspersions on India’s vibrant multicultural society"—a stance it has repeated for the last decade following every annual report—the White House has refrained from acting against New Delhi despite strong recommendations, including the imposition of economic sanctions.

This time, too, USCIRF has advised the White House to act against India by designating it as a “country of particular concern” (CPC) for engaging in and tolerating what it calls "systematic, ongoing, and egregious religious freedom violations," as defined by the US' International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA).

Referring to India in considerable detail, the USCIRF report states that in 2024, religious freedom conditions in India "continued to deteriorate" as attacks and discrimination against religious minorities continued to rise. It notes that prior to national elections in June, BJP members, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, "propagated hateful rhetoric and disinformation against Muslims and other religious minorities to gather political support."

Such rhetoric, the report underlines, fueled attacks on religious minorities that continued after the election, including vigilante violence, targeted and arbitrary killings, and the demolition of property and places of worship. Authorities used "anti-terror and financing laws," including the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA), to crack down on civil society organizations and detain members of religious minorities, human rights defenders, and journalists reporting on religious freedom.

Offering examples of misinformation fueling anti-minority sentiments, the report states that ahead of the June elections, Modi repeatedly claimed that the opposition party would “wipe out [the] Hindu faith from the country” and referred to Muslims as “infiltrators," while Union Home Minister Amit Shah alleged that opposition leaders would impose Shari’a law if elected.

Such misinformation and hate speech, the report claims, "incited" attacks against religious minorities. These included clashes between the Christian Kuki community and the majority Hindu Meitei community in Manipur; attacks on Muslims in Mira Road, Mumbai, following inflammatory speeches by two MLAs; eight village councils in Chhattisgarh passing a joint resolution requiring Christians to renounce their faith or leave the village; four individuals killed in Uttar Pradesh following a dispute over whether a 16th-century mosque was built over the site of a Hindu temple; and a dozen attacks involving “cow vigilantism” across India.

Further, the report notes that several states introduced or strengthened anti-conversion laws. The Chhattisgarh government claimed this was needed to stop Christian pastors from forcibly converting Hindus; Assam decided to draft a law to ensure stricter punishment for “love jihad,” including life imprisonment; Gujarat issued a circular mandating that Hindus wishing to convert to Buddhism, Sikhism, or Jainism obtain approval from their district magistrate under the anti-conversion law; and the Uttar Pradesh government tabled a bill to strengthen that law, expanding punishment for religious conversion to life imprisonment and making it a "non-bailable offense," which led to the sentencing of a Muslim cleric and 11 others to life imprisonment.

The report suggests that intimidation wasn't confined to within the country. It states that "journalists, academics, and civil society organizations documenting India’s religious freedom violations reported denial of consular services, including the revocation of Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) cards, as well as threats of violence and surveillance."

Meanwhile, within the US, the report highlights demands to place on hold the sale of MQ-9 drones to India in response to that country’s use of transnational repression; concerns expressed about the Citizenship Amendment Act; objections raised to India’s use of the FCRA to restrict NGOs from receiving foreign funding; and calls for an investigation into the 2023 plot to kill a U.S.-based Indian American Sikh activist, with a New York district court summoning India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval (photo) and former RAW chief Samant Goel.

Despite all this, the report regrets that the U.S. and Indian governments have continued to strengthen their bilateral relationship. Hence, it recommends that US authorities:

- Impose targeted sanctions on individuals and entities, such as Vikash Yadav and RAW, for their culpability in severe violations of religious freedom by freezing their assets and/or barring their entry into the United States.

- Encourage the U.S. Embassy and consulates to incorporate religious freedom into public statements and speeches, as outlined in the U.S. Department of State’s Guidelines to Support Civil Society and Human Rights Defenders.

- Reintroduce, pass, and enforce the Transnational Repression Reporting Act of 2024 to ensure the annual reporting of acts of transnational repression by the Indian government targeting religious minorities in the United States.

- Conduct a review assessing whether arms sales to India, such as MQ-9B drones under Section 36 of the Arms Export Control Act, may contribute to or exacerbate religious freedom violations.

- Request and prioritize meetings with religious minority communities and faith-based civil society organizations during congressional delegations to India.