india

Updated: Feb 22, 2018 23:57 IST

Religious minorities in India faced increasing “demonization”, global rights group Amnesty International said on Thursday, accusing Indian authorities of using laws to stifle freedom of expression in the country.

In its latest annual report, the group paints a bleak picture of the human rights situation in South Asia. With reference to India, it said incidents like cow vigilantism and lynchings in the name of beef-eating plagued India over the past year.

“At least 10 Muslim men were lynched and many injured by vigilante cow protection groups,” the report said, adding many of them seemed to operate with the support of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

The report also speaks about threats to journalists and the killing of Gauri Lankesh, an editor who was shot dead outside her residence in Bengaluru last year.

“Several journalists and human rights defenders lost their lives. Freedom of expression in universities also remained under threat. Lankesh, an outspoken critic of Hindu nationalism and the caste system, was shot dead outside her home in Bengaluru by unidentified gunmen in September. Criminal defamation cases were brought against several journalists,” the report said.

“Repressive laws were used to stifle freedom of expression...state governments banned books, and the central film certification board denied the theatrical release of certain films, on vague and overly broad grounds,” Amnesty said.

A response from the government was awaited as of the time this report was published.

Minar Pimple, director operations, Amnesty, said the politics of populism and demonisation was spreading across the world but was being met by resistance in the US and in India with the ‘Not in My Name’ campaign.

Biraj Patnaik, regional director South Asia, said space for civil society in the whole of South Asian region was shrinking and “India’s neighbours are learning all bad things” from the country like variants of Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, Cybersecurity Act were being initiated in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The report cites examples and of caste-based discrimination, communal violence, and crimes against women and children in India.

In Jammu and Kashmir, impunity for human rights abuses continued and security forces continued to use inherently inaccurate pellet-firing shotguns during protests, blinding and injuring several people, the report said.

The report said that hate crimes against Dalits remained widespread as official statistics released in November stated that more than 40,000 crimes against Scheduled Castes were reported in 2016.

“Authorities were openly critical of human rights defenders and organizations, contributing to a climate of hostility against them,” the report said, citing the deaths of two Dalit men who were killed by members of a dominant caste in Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, following a clash.

“Activists said that at least 90 Dalits employed as manual scavengers died during the year while cleaning sewers, despite the practice being prohibited,” it stated.

It also highlights that an estimated 40,000 Rohingya people in India were at risk of mass expulsion. They included more than 16,000 who were recognized as refugees by UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, it said.