US lawmakers seek congressional consultation on IPEF
On the eve of the US hosting the first in-person Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) Ministerial in Los Angeles, a group of more than 40 influential lawmakers on Thursday urged the Biden administration for a robust engagement with the Congress on this critical trade issue. A letter written by Chair of the House Appropriations Committee Rosa DeLauro, Senator Elizabeth Warren and Senator Bernie Sanders, along with 42 House Democrats urged the Biden administration to learn from the failures of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The first in-person IPEF Ministerial in Los Angeles, beginning Thursday, is being attended by Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal among others. "We urge you to consider the lessons of past trade negotiations that too often were conducted in secret, with members of Congress, workers and their unions, environmentalists, and consumer advocates largely unable to review text and ensure their interests were addressed,” the lawmakers wrote. "…If negotiations on IPEF and APEP proceed, we urge you to ensure that any agreement benefits American workers, not corporate offshoring, and to provide Congress and the public with clearer insight into your approach to the negotiation process, including through robust consultation throughout the process and congressional approval of any binding commitments,” it said. The letter
‘Over 300 Attacks Against Christians Till July 2022’: NGO Data Based on Distress Calls
The Union government had told the Supreme Court that the allegations in a petition calling for a probe into attacks against Christians were based on 'falsehoods' and 'self-serving reports.' New Delhi: Last week, the Union government told the Supreme Court that a public interest litigation urging action against attacks on Christian was based on “self-serving reports”. Data gathered by a non-governmental organisation based on distress calls it received on a helpline number, however, records over 300 incidents of attacks – verbal, physical and with help of law enforcement – on Christians until July this year. On August 28, three people were arrested from a small village of Harchandpur in Uttar Pradesh’s Rae Bareilly over allegations that they had attempted to forcibly converted people. On the day, the three – Ramvati, Dashrath and Raghuveer – say that activists affiliated to Hindutva organisations thronged their church, ostensibly in protest against ‘conversion attempts’ by the three. Hindutva groups had also complained to the police alleging the same. The FIR – accessed by The Wire – charges them under Section 295A (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) of the Indian Penal Code and Sections 3 and
Income Tax Searches At Think Tank CPR, Oxfam, And Trust That Funds Media
Bengaluru-based trustIPSMF funds some media organisations known for investigative stories that question the governments of the day Searches at the Centre for Policy Research office in Delhi's Chanakyapuri started around noon. The Income Tax Department is conducting searches at the Delhi offices of independent think tank Centre for Policy Research and charity organisation Oxfam India; and at Bengaluru-based Independent and Public-Spirited Media Foundation (IPSMF) that partly funds a number of digital media outlets such as The Caravan, The Print and Swarajya. No response has yet been received from any of the organisations facing action. Sources in the tax department told NDTV that the "surveys" are connected to simultaneous action in Haryana, Maharashtra and Gujarat, among other places, "over funding of more than 20 registered but non-recognised political parties". News agency PTI said, citing sources, that the action is part of a probe over foreign donations. No official statement is out yet. Bengaluru-based trust IPSMF funds some organisations known for investigative stories that question the governments of the day. The most recent cover story in The Caravan — a magazine and portal backed by the Foundation — questioned a probe report that cleared PM Narendra Modi of any role in the 2002 Gujarat riots. The Supreme
Indian Christians welcome top court’s move on persecution
States ordered to verify allegations of persecution after federal government described cases as fake Christian leaders have lauded India’s top court for directing the states to verify allegations of persecution against the community people after the federal government refuted their complaints as baseless. “We are satisfied with the Supreme Court order,” Archbishop Peter Machado of the Archdiocese of Bangalore (now Bengaluru) told UCA News on Sept. 5. Archbishop Machado, based in Bengaluru, capital of southern Karnataka state, is one of the petitioners in the public interest litigation (PIL) that sought direction to end the persecution against Christians in the country. A division bench comprising Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice Hima Kohli in an interim order directed chief secretaries of eight states to verify allegations of persecution of Christians listed in the PIL. The verification, the court said, would help it know the reality after the federal government described the incidents listed in the PIL as fake cases and urged the court to dismiss the petition. The top court in its Sept. 1 order also directed the states to provide information such as preliminary police reports, status of investigation, arrests made and charges filed. The top court also directed the petitioners to provide a detailed breakdown of the
India’s gov’t claims there is no rising persecution of Christians documented attacks
Around 200 attacks on Christians were reported within the first five months of this year in India, but the country’s government claimed before the Supreme Court that persecution of Christians was based on “half-baked and self-serving facts and self-serving articles and reports…based upon mere conjecture.” “There appears to be some hidden oblique agenda in filing such deceptive petitions, creating unrest throughout the country and perhaps for getting assistance from outside the country to meddle with internal affairs of our nation,” India’s federal interior ministry said in its response to a petition filed by Christian groups demanding an investigation into rising attacks on Christians and requesting police protection for places of worship, the Hindustan Times reported. Submitting the federal government’s response, India’s Solicitor General, Tushar Mehta, told Justices Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud and A.S. Bopanna that it was only a “preliminary note.” Senior Advocate Colin Gonsalves, who said there were about 500 attacks on Christians across the country in 2021 alone, is preparing a response to the claim of the government led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The government claimed, “In some cases, incidents of purely criminal nature and arising out of personal issues, have been categorized as violence
Modi’s India Is Where Global Democracy Dies
Prime Minister Narendra Modi stood last month atop India’s nearly completed new Parliament, built to mark the country’s 75 years of independence, and pulled a lever. A sprawling red curtain fell back to reveal the structure’s crowning statue. Many across India gasped. The 21-foot-tall bronze icon — four lions seated with their backs to one another, facing outward — is India’s revered national symbol. The beasts are normally depicted as regal and restrained, but these looked different: Their fangs bared, they seemed angry, aggressive. To Mr. Modi’s critics, the refashioned image atop the Parliament — a project that was rammed through without debate or public consultation — reflects the snarling “New India” he is creating. In his eight years in power, Mr. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party government has profaned Indian democracy, espousing an intolerant Hindu supremacist majoritarianism over the ideals of secularism, pluralism, religious tolerance and equal citizenship upon which the country was founded after gaining independence on Aug. 15, 1947. Drawing comparisons to Nazi Germany, the regime uses co-opted government machinery, disinformation and intimidation by partisan mobs to silence critics while dehumanizing the large Muslim minority, fanning social division and violence. Civil liberties are systematically violated. India, the world’s largest democracy, is where the
75 years of Indian independence and the outlook’s bleak
We find ourselves slowly slipping back into the feudal mess we came out of Among national festivals in many countries, Independence Day usually takes first place. It’s the day that celebrates the birth of a nation, the shaking off of colonial oppression, the welding of many ethnic groups into one modern state. When India celebrates 75 years as a nation on Aug. 15, it’s also an occasion to ask ourselves: Has independence made a difference? How has freedom changed us? Have we realized the hopes we had? Not easy questions to answer. Looking at the broad picture, one can see two contradictory movements in almost every area of life. On the one hand, we celebrate the rise of the ordinary person, the aam aadmi, the aam aurat. Today the president of the republic is a tribal woman, a public statement that even the most oppressed groups can make it to the top. "Standards of education are in decline almost everywhere, universities are in disarray, and in many places, there’s violent hostility to girls going to school" And yet, on the other hand, every day brings home the almost total failure of the sarkar — the ruling class. In those memorable words of Gurcharan Das: “India grows by night,
Religious minorities ‘on a precipice’ as violent persecution spirals across India
The situation facing Christians and other religious minorities in India is ‘unprecedentedly grave’, says an Open Doors spokesperson. Across India, people are celebrating the 75th anniversary of Indian Independence. Christians and other religious minorities will be joining in the celebrations – but also recognising that they face discrimination that is ‘unprecedentedly grave’, in the words of Heena Singh*, Open Doors spokesperson on India. “The gravity of the situation, for Christians and Muslims especially, is at its peak,” says Heena. “Every day we receive new prayer requests from friends, for another Christian family attacked, or a pastor arrested on false accusation.” Hostility against Christians is getting worse There is a very large number of Christians in India – almost 69 million, according to Open Doors research – but this is only about five per cent of the country’s population. Christians and other religious minorities have long experienced some hostility, but attitudes are hardening and persecution is worsening as the influence of Hindutva increases. "Now it is often entire communities attacking and expelling converts." HEENA, OPEN DOORS “It is no longer small extremist groups attacking converts, now it is often entire communities attacking and expelling them, beating them or handing them over to the police on false accusations,” says
India at 75: Championing democracy abroad, hollowing it out at home
Western allies are likely to ignore the country’s transition into an ethnocracy given its role in balancing China. India’s democracy faces a crisis unprecedented in its 75-year-old history. An ethnocratic imagination undermines the inclusive Indian nationalism that imbued its founding movement and that aims to consolidate its Hindu majority as the dominant ethnos. Not only do religious minorities find themselves identified as internal enemies, but members of the historically oppressed Bahujan communities who do not conform to the image of a good Hindu are sought to be marginalised. In recent years, the list of internal enemies has come to include liberals and leftists, activists who have raised issues of the environment and human rights, and anyone else perceived to be “anti-national”. Dissent is muzzled, increasingly through official edicts. Old controversies over temples and mosques are reignited, as in Mathura and Varanasi over the last few months, where claims that mosques were built upon the demolition of temples have resurfaced. Local compromises negotiated by Hindus and Muslims over centuries are challenged, and new religious flashpoints threaten to rent asunder the social fabric knitted together by India’s diverse communities. India shares its democratic degradation with many other countries across the world. This process has been variously described as
Indian tribal Christians counter moves to deny them welfare benefits
Hindu nationalists in Chhattisgarh want those converted to Christianity removed from beneficiary list Tribal Christians in Ambikapur Diocese protest against the campaign by Hindu nationalists to remove them as beneficiaries of government welfare schemes in Chhattisgarh, India, on June 12 Tribal people including Christians in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh are up in arms about attempts by Hindu nationalist forces to rob them of reservation benefits. Reservations form a system of affirmative action in India that provides representation in education, employment and politics for historically disadvantaged groups such as tribal people, Dalits and backward castes. Tribal people in Chhattisgarh are alarmed by Janjati Suraksha Manch (JSM) or tribal protection forum, which is affiliated with the Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), undertaking a concerted campaign to remove tribal Christians and Muslims from the list of reservation beneficiaries. Demands to delist Christians and Muslims have been raised for the past 15 years or so but Hindu nationalists started holding rallies in support of the move for the first time in May. “The demand and the public rallies in support of it are motivated by political gains,” Bishop Emmanuel Kerketta of Jashpur told UCA News on June 15. There is currently no religious bar to tribal people being
