Amnesty halts India operations after government crackdown

Human rights group Amnesty International stopped its work in India on Tuesday, saying the government had frozen its bank accounts in the latest action against it for speaking out about rights violations.

The group said it had laid off staff after facing a crackdown over the past two years over allegations of financial wrongdoing that were baseless.

“This is the latest in the incessant witch-hunt of human rights organisations by the government of India over unfounded and motivated allegations,” Amnesty said.

Its bank accounts were frozen on September 10, it said.

Amnesty had highlighted rights violations in recent months in the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region as well as what it said was a lack of police accountability during riots in Delhi in February, and the government had sought to punish it, it said.

There was no immediate response from government spokespersons to requests for comment.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has faced accusations that it is clamping down on dissent, including in Muslim-majority Kashmir, where insurgents have battled government forces for more than 30 years.

Critics also say the government is pushing a Hindu-first agenda, undermining the secular foundations of India’s democracy and raising fears among its 170 million Muslim minority.

The government denies any bias against any community.

Opposition politician Shashi Tharoor said Amnesty’s exit was a blow.

“India’s stature as a liberal democracy with free institutions, including media and civil society organisations, accounted for much of its soft power in the world. Actions like this both undermine our reputation as a democracy and vitiate our soft power,” he said on Twitter.

Amnesty said the federal financial crimes investigation agency, the Enforcement Directorate, had targeted it.

“For a movement that has done nothing but raise its voices against injustice, this latest attack is akin to freezing dissent,” said the director of Amnesty International India Avinash Kumar.

Amnesty and other groups have accused police of complicity in the riots in Delhi in which at least 50 people were killed, most of them Muslims.

Police denied the allegation.—