State of Emergency: UN CERD Report on India

In his first review by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) since 2007, India has expressed “serious concern” on reports of law enforcement agencies resorting to violence – physical and otherwise – against minority ethnic and ethno-religious groups, Dalits and stateless persons over the years. The Committee also noted that India, which ratified the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1968, has not provided detailed and updated information on state investigations and sanctions resulting from allegations of such violence. While the government told CERD that caste bias did not fall within Article 1 of the Convention because caste was not synonymous with race, CERD allowed all forms of discrimination based on inherited status. The Committee’s concerns also relate to the practice of manual sewer cleaning despite the law prohibiting it; hate speech against, poor living conditions and mass repatriation of Rohingya Muslims; mass revocation of citizenship through the National Register of Citizens; large-scale deletions from special intensive revisions of electoral rolls; the government’s use of FCRA, UAPA, AFSPA and PMLA tools to restrict the work of CSOs; The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita does not specifically criminalize racist hate speech; and the Forests (Conservation) Amendment Act, which exempts “national security” projects from consultative decision-making.

Given these problems and the fragmented remedy available, the lack of appropriately disaggregated data on disenfranchised communities, due, inter alia, to the long-delayed census and slow release of NCRB data, has crossed the line into administrative lethargy that actively impedes independent scrutiny of India’s anti-caste and creed discrimination claims. In fact, India is introducing “special measures” based on the 2011 census data that could mask regression in the socio-economic status of Scheduled Tribes and Adivasis. Along with the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions, which last year recommended downgrading the NHRC after the government appointed police officers to investigative roles and lacked plurality, CERD effectively steps into a vacuum. The way forward remains clear, from restoring the NHRC’s independence and criminalizing hate speech to supporting affirmative action, collecting and disclosing disaggregated data and improving transparency by revising electoral rolls and strengthening enforcement overall. But if the government’s attempt to use technicalities to keep the problems of 200 million Dalits “domestic” and avoid international accountability—and its dismissal of CERD’s concerns as politically motivated—is any guide, the onus remains on civil society to exert influence in multilateral forums and maintain political, legal, and administrative resistance to government decisions that normalize India’s culture of sad discrimination.

Published – 31 Aug 2026 0:20 AM IST