India Is Only “Partly Free” Under Modi’s Rule: Freedom Report

India’s status has lowered to “partly free” from the earlier “free” country, as per the annual report on political rights and civil liberties. US government-funded non-profit organisation, Freedom House, in its report said: “Political rights and civil liberties in the country have deteriorated since Narendra Modi became prime minister in 2014, with increased pressure on human rights organizations, rising intimidation of academics and journalists, and a spate of bigoted attacks, including lynchings, aimed at Muslims.” The decline “accelerated” after 2019 with Modi’s reelection, it said.

The report titled “Democracy under siege” said that the fall in India’s status from the “upper ranks of free nations” may have a damaging impact on international democratic standards as it indicates a global shift in the balance between democracy and authoritarianism. The Narendra Modi-led government in India, along with its allies in states, continued to crack down on dissent during 2020, the report mentioned. Freedom House, which conducts research on political freedom and human rights, said the number of countries labelled “not free” was high since 2006.

The global freedom report noted that the lockdown imposed, all of a sudden, to check Coronavirus “resulted in the dangerous and unplanned displacement of millions of internal migrant workers”.

The lockdown announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 24, 2020, left lakhs of migrant workers stranded in big cities without work. Many of them started walking home for thousands of kilometres in the scorching heat and some of them died on the way due to illness, while others died in road accidents. A few others died of exhaustion after reaching home.

Facing criticism over the migrant workers, the Centre launched “Shramik” trains on May 1 to shift them home. However, in September, the BJP-led NDA government informed the apex court that it has no data on the number of guest workers who lost their lives walking or travelling home during lockdown.

The Freedom House report added:

“The ruling Hindu nationalist movement also encouraged the scapegoating of Muslims, who were disproportionately blamed for the spread of the virus and faced attacks by vigilante mobs. 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.”

— Freedom House report

The report also mentioned about other countries, including China, which spread “global disinformation and a censorship campaign” to cover up the Covid-19 outbreak. The report said that US too had a democratic decline during the final years of Trump’s presidency.

The report added that “the countries with declines in political rights and civil liberties outnumbered those with gains by the largest margin recorded since 2006.”