The Citizenship Amendment Act, passed in December by the Parliament in majority-Hindu India, violates religious freedom especially for Muslims, said the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom in its annual report released Tuesday.
The rating came in the annual report of the body charged with monitoring religious freedom abroad and the U.S. government’s response. to them.
The controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) gives Hindus and religious minorities from neighboring countries — including Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan — a fast track to citizenship, it excludes Muslims.
The commission recommended that the State Department designate India as a “country of particular concern,” or CPC, because it “tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom.”
“It showed the central government’s involvement in repressing religious freedom and, of course, the consequence of that can very well be millions of Muslims in detention, deportation and statelessness when the government completes its planned national register of citizens,” said the USCIRF Vice Chair Nadine Maenza.
The 104-page report chronicled the progress and failures on religious freedom in 29 countries during 2019.
Federal Minister for Human Rights in Pakistan weighing in on the report said: “Finally even US cannot ignore the reality of the racist Hindutva Supremacist creed of the Indian govt. India declared a Country of Particular Concern for the first time by the U.S. Commission of International Religious Freedom.”
Finally even US cannot ignore the reality of the racist Hindutva Supremacist creed of the Indian govt. India declared a Country of Particular Concern for the first time by the U.S. Commission of International Religious Freedom.https://t.co/MCczqckfCm
— Shireen Mazari (@ShireenMazari1) April 28, 2020
