"India is now a 'partly free' country," is the assessment of an annual report on global political rights and liberties.
In their report titled "Democracy Under Siege," Freedom House, a non-profit organization, states that civil liberties have been systematically clamped down since PM Narendra Modi held office in 2014.
"Under Modi, India appears to have abandoned its potential to serve as a global democratic leader, elevating narrow Hindu nationalist interests at the expense of its founding values of inclusion and equal rights for all," they wrote in their report.
"Increased pressure on human rights organisations, intimidation of journalists and activists, and a spate of attacks, especially those against Muslims, had led to a deterioration of political and civil liberties in the country," they added in their report.
The speculated cause was the tilted balance between democracy and authoritarianism. Per the organization's assessment, the power shift in India causing their "fall from the upper ranks of free nations" could have dire impacts on the world's understanding of democracy.
On December 1 in Bangalore, activists and demonstrators from different human and civil rights organisations condemned state governments influenced by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in their plan to pass proposed laws against "Love Jihad."
Critics also slammed the Citizenship Amendment Act on the grounds that the bill is just a smokescreen to BJP's agenda of marginalizing more Muslims in India where Hindus are the majority. Consequently, crackdowns against those opposing the bill followed.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are Hindu nationalists and they won a landslide victory during the 2014 general election. The party gave PM Modi more executive power in the succeeding years.
Since then, several minority groups have been subjected to discrimination. The oppression alarmingly got worse after 2019.
According to the freedom report, the ruling Hindu nationalist movement have encouraged the "scapegoating of Muslims...disproportionately blaming them for the spread of the virus." This political ploy had subjected many Muslims to unjust attacks from vigilante mobs.
Aside from the Muslim communities, it's very important to note that violence against Christians were also carried out by radical nationalists. Church gatherings and worship services were also banned.
India also passed its harshest anti-conversion law against Christians, and extremists have been using this law as a means to harass and attack Christians in the country.
Nonetheless, the number of believers in house churches still grew amidst persecution and the pandemic.
"Rather than serving as a champion of democratic practice and a counterweight to authoritarian influence from countries such as China, Modi and his party are tragically driving India itself toward authoritarianism," the report said.
Freedom House's report also noted the government's "iron-fisted" management since the onset of the pandemic particularly their inaction to aid migrants and minority groups.
In March of last year, the country was put under sudden lockdown leaving millions of stranded migrant workers stranded without work and money. Still, many strove to return home by walking hundreds of miles risking death from exhaustion, accidents, and other dangerous encounters, the BBC reported.
"With India's decline to Partly Free, less than 20% of the world's population now lives in a Free country, the smallest proportion since 1995," Freedom House's report concluded.
The Indian government, however, is silent on all the enumerated charges from the said report.
