Racial discrimination in India and the UN committee report

The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) has expressed deep concern over reports indicating that a large segment of people in India — including Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Rohingyas, Bengali-speaking Muslims, refugees, and migrants — are facing human rights violations. In a press release issued on the occasion of the ninth anniversary of the Rohingya crisis, the UN committee sought immediate action against hate speech and hate crimes in India. The committee expresses concern over human rights violations committed by law enforcement personnel against the aforementioned groups. The UN panel points out that severe violations have been reported, including racial hatred, violence, use of force, killings, prolonged detention without necessary legal procedures, torture, ill-treatment, and sexual violence. The committee reminds that India, which became a state party to the 1968 International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, has failed to submit a detailed and updated report regarding such atrocities. The UN committee has also drawn attention to measures for mass exclusion from the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and voters' lists. The committee's report further highlights the obstruction of civil society organizations' operations through laws such as FCRA, UAPA, and AFSPA. Meanwhile, the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita lacks explicit criminal laws that penalize hate speech. The committee also highlights that police investigations and identity checks based on racial profiling lead to unlawful and arbitrary arrests and detentions.

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No matter how much Narendra Modi's Hindutva government conceals or ignores the reality, and no matter how much it attempts to create a smokescreen by highlighting human rights protection clauses in the Constitution—which the regime itself does not take at face value—there is no greater stupidity than failing to realize that the stark truths of a post-truth world will inevitably come to light. Neither the blackout tactics of the Godi media nor the ongoing threats directed at Meta, the owner of social media platforms, are sufficient to hide or cover up the unvarnished truth. This is an era where the world continues to learn even the secret news and events of the Zionist state — believed to be tenfold more secure, powerful, and safer than India — through international media. It is clear from the panel's report that in India—which stands 157th globally in media freedom, and where a government framing adventurous journalists in criminal cases to blackout news has become standard practice—the UN CERD continues to receive the naked truths about the world's largest democracy through its own independent sources, bypassing all state restrictions. Even the news of police firing pellets at the CJP youth-student protest that unfolded most recently at Jantar Mantar, and the sexual assault of female student protesters, broke through the iron curtain of the Ministry of Home Affairs to reach the outside world.

Now, the leaders of the saffron brigade are contemplating how to escape from this humiliation. Rather than registering a case against the Hindutva caste extremists who performed a 'purification' ritual at a venue addressed by Mallikarjun Kharge, the Dalit President of the All India Congress Committee, their effort is directed at reining in Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi for condemning the shameful incident. The UN panel expressed its deepest concern precisely over the severe discrimination and inhumane atrocities directed against Dalits, Adivasis, and other marginalized millions. Along with this, the world has learned — through the UN committee report and otherwise — about the ongoing bulldozer actions, denial of ration, and total boycotts targeted at the Bengali-speaking Muslim population by figures like Himanta Biswa Sarma and Suvendu Adhikari in states like Assam and Bengal which faced Assembly elections. Meanwhile, the chief of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh — a hundred-year-old extremist racist movement responsible for all of this — travels to America to utter grand rhetoric claiming that Muslims, Christians, and other minorities are citizens with equal rights in India. The world also witnessed protests by those in America who publicly ridiculed and rejected this ludicrous contradiction. While it is true that a leopard cannot erase its spots, we would only point out that there are also exciting signs visible on the horizon: a younger generation that believes in secular democracy is standing firmly committed to correcting these wrongs.

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