“Deliberate Agenda”: India On USCIRF's Religious Freedom Report
India has strongly criticised the 2025 Annual Report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), calling it a politically motivated and biased assessment. Official Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal dismissed the report, stating that it deliberately misrepresents incidents and undermines India’s status as a diverse and democratic nation.
Jaiswal emphasised that India, home to 1.4 billion people of various faiths, upholds religious freedom as a fundamental right. He accused the USCIRF of following an agenda rather than genuinely engaging with India’s pluralistic framework. “The USCIRF’s persistent attempts to cast aspersions on India’s vibrant multicultural society reflect a deliberate agenda rather than a genuine concern for religious freedom,” he remarked.
India also took a firm stance against any attempts to damage its global reputation, stating that such efforts to paint the country as intolerant would not succeed. Jaiswal even suggested that the USCIRF itself should be categorised as an “entity of concern” for its repeated misrepresentation of India’s religious sphere.
The USCIRF report alleged that religious freedom conditions in India worsened in 2024, citing an increase in attacks and discrimination against minorities. It accused members of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, of spreading hateful rhetoric before the national elections in June, which it claimed led to violence against Muslims and other minority communities. The report also highlighted instances of vigilante attacks, targeted killings, and demolition of religious properties.
It criticised the use of laws such as the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) to suppress civil society organisations and detain journalists and activists. The report also took issue with India’s implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), alleging that it sparked fear among Muslim communities regarding their citizenship status, particularly in Assam, where several people were declared “non-citizens” and placed in detention centres.
Additionally, the USCIRF raised concerns over alleged religious discrimination in India’s governance, mentioning the demolition of mosques to construct Hindu temples, the expansion of anti-conversion laws, and the crackdown on interfaith marriages under the Uniform Civil Code (UCC). It also accused the Indian government of targeting Sikhs abroad through surveillance and denial of consular services, referring to international intelligence reports that linked Indian officials to an assassination attempt on a Sikh activist in New York.
New Delhi has consistently rejected the USCIRF’s findings, asserting that India’s legal and constitutional framework guarantees religious freedom and equal rights to all citizens. Indian authorities argue that such reports fail to acknowledge the country’s commitment to democracy and tolerance.
