US report on religious freedom praises UPA, raps regional chauvinists

The first International Religious Freedom Report of the Obama administration while praised the UPA government for its national policies regarding freedom of religion in India, sharply criticised the approach by those in state and local levels.

Citing various incidents of violence, including Kandhamal, the report underlined that although the Constitution of India provides for freedom of religion, some state level laws and policies have restricted this.

"The National Government generally respected religious freedom in practice; however, some state and local governments imposed limits on this freedom," the report stated, adding "Some state governments enacted and amended "anticonversion" laws, and police and enforcement agencies often did not act swiftly to counter communal attacks effectively, including attacks against religious minorities."

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released the report in Washington on Monday. It addresses the state of religious freedom in 198 countries and territories.

Praising India for its religious plurality, the report declared that "vast majority of Indians of all religious groups lived in peaceful coexistence" and "the country's democratic system, open society, independent legal institutions, vibrant civil society, and freewheeling press all provide mechanisms to address violations of religious freedom when they occur."

However, it did not fail to observe the sharp rise of fundamentalism, which has fueled communal and ethnic violence that has had a devastating effect on religious minorities.

"Despite the National Government's rejection of "Hindutva," the ideology that espouses the inculcation of Hindu religious and cultural norms above other religious norms, "Hindutva" continued to influence the policies of some state and local governments and actions at the state and local levels," the report said.

It continued that these Hindutva extremists had attacked Christian prayer meetings, assaulted pastors and lay persons, and confiscated and destroyed religious material.

Reminding the Kandhamal violence, the report noted that the large-scale violence, which included the August 25 alleged rape of a Christian nun, attracted worldwide media attention. "The police arrested 1,200 persons and registered more than 1,000 criminal cases" and "an estimated 3,200 refugees remained in relief camps, down from 24,000 in the immediate aftermath of the violence."

Among the several sensitive issues, 'religious conversion' was one the report prominently mentioned about.

"There are active "anticonversion" laws in five of the 28 states: Gujarat, Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Himachal Pradesh; however, there were no reports of convictions under these laws," it said. "Arunachal Pradesh has an inactive "anticonversion" law awaiting regulations needed for enforcement."

"There were no reports of forced religious conversions" but still "authorities arrested numerous Christians under state-level "anticonversion" laws during the reporting period for allegedly engaging in conversions by force, allurement, or fraud."

Christians claim that "low-caste Hindus converted of their own free will and that efforts by Hindu groups to "reconvert" these new Christians to Hinduism were accompanied by offers of remuneration and thus fraudulent."

In her news briefing on the report, Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton said that "It is our hope that the ... report will encourage existing religious freedom movements around the world and promote dialogue among governments and within societies on how best to accommodate religious communities and protect each individual's right to believe or not believe as that individual sees fit."