New Delhi: India's political system facilitates discrimination against religious minorities, with ties between the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) enabling “discriminatory” laws, according to the latest update brief from the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) on the South Asian country.

The bipartisan US Congress-backed body released an India-specific issue update that claimed "the implementation of national and state-level laws create severe restrictions on religious freedom across the country."

There has been no response from the Union government so far. But, after the release of the 2025 annual report by USCIRF in March this year, the Ministry of External Affairs dismissed it and claimed that the US body was continuing “its pattern of issuing biased and politically motivated assessments”.

It concluded that "despite offering some constitutional protections for FoRB (Freedom of Religion or Belief), India's political system facilitates a climate of discrimination toward religious minority communities."

Further, it noted that the "interconnected relationship" between the BJP and the RSS, which it describes as a "Hindu nationalist group," has led to "creation and enforcement of several discriminatory pieces of legislation, including citizenship, anti-conversion, and cow slaughter laws."

Since 2014, the BJP has "enforced sectarian policies seeking to establish India as an overtly Hindu state, in contrast with the secular principles of the constitution”.

The USCIRF asserted that the enforcement of these laws "disproportionately targets and impacts religious minorities and their ability to freely practice their religion or belief as outlined in Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which India is a signatory."

"The RSS's primary mission is to build a 'Hindu Rastra,' or Hindu state," the commission found, noting that it "promotes the notion that India is a Hindu nation, excluding Muslims, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Parsis, and other religious minorities."

The report notes that while the RSS does not field political candidates directly, it provides volunteers to campaign for the BJP, including Prime Minister Modi himself. 

According to the update, Modi was an RSS youth member before serving as chief minister of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014, where the report says he faced accusations of inaction during anti-Muslim riots in 2002 that resulted in thousands of deaths.

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Last week, a US media outlet reported that the RSS had started a lobbying campaign among power circles in the United States. According to lobbying disclosures filed with the US government, the firm Squire Patton Boggs (SPB) was paid $330,000 during the first three quarters of 2025 to represent the RSS’s interests before the US Senate and House of Representatives.

In 2019, the Citizenship (Amendment) Act provides fast-tracked citizenship to persecuted religious groups from neighbouring countries while explicitly excluding Muslim migrants. 

The report also notes that Article 295A of the Penal Code functions as a blasphemy law by criminalising actions deemed to "outrage religious feelings." Several states also maintain and enforce anti-conversion and cow slaughter laws that impose harsh fines and lengthy prison sentences.

According to the report, hundreds of Christians and Muslims have been arrested under anti-conversion laws, with 70% of India's inmates being pre-trial detainees and religious minorities disproportionately represented.

The report cites the case of Umar Khalid, who has been detained since 2020 for leading peaceful protests opposing the religiously discriminatory Citizenship (Amendment) Act, as an example of religious minorities spending years in jail without trial.

India's federal political system gives state governments jurisdiction over law enforcement, while the national Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) cannot investigate state-level crimes without state government permission, the update explains. This structure creates limited accountability for state-perpetrated violations of human rights, with law enforcement often failing to address mob violence targeting Christian and Muslim communities.

In its 2025 Annual Report, USCIRF for the sixth time recommended that the US Department of State designate India as a Country of Particular Concern for engaging in systematic, ongoing, and egregious religious freedom violations. The State department has so far not acted on this recommendation.

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