U.S. thinktank Freedom House downgrades India’s status to ‘partly free’

Washington-based noted think tank Freedom House has demoted India’s freedom score from “free” to “partly free”, saying rights and civil liberties “have been eroding since Narendra Modi became Prime Minister in 2014”, specifically referring to attacks on Muslims, use of the sedition law, and the government’s coronavirus response including the lockdown.

India’s score decreased from 71 to 67, with 100 being the ranking for the most free country, and its rank fell from 83 to 88 out of 211 countries.

Key Highlights

• In its annual report, Freedom House said, “His (Modi’s) Hindu nationalist government has presided over 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 deepened following Modi’s reelection in 2019, and the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 featured further abuses of fundamental rights.”
• In a press release, the organisation underscored a “pattern in which the Hindu nationalist government and its allies have presided over rising violence and discriminatory policies affecting the Muslim population and pursued a crackdown on expressions of dissent by the media, academics, civil society groups, and protesters”.
• India’s score of 67 puts it on a par with Ecuador and Dominican Republic. Freedom House noted that the change in India’s status from “Free” to “Partly Free” was the most significant for 2020, “meaning less than 20 percent of the world’s people now live in a Free country — the smallest proportion since 1995″.
• The most free countries in the world, with a score of 100, are Finland, Norway and Sweden, while the least free with a score of 1 are Tibet and Syria.
• The organisation assesses nations on 25 different indicators. The Freedom House report again listed “Indian Kashmir” separately, and retained its status as last year of “not free” (the first time it had done so), with the score for it falling from 28 to 27. Between 2013 and 2019, “Indian Kashmir” was labelled as “partly free”. Its score fell from 28 to 27.
• India’s Internet Freedom Score has stayed at 51. However, the report stated that “internet freedom in India declined dramatically for a third straight year”, citing Internet shutdowns, blocked content, disinformation spread by political leaders, online harassment, amendments to the Foreign Direct Investment Policy, coordinated spyware campaigns, and digital monitoring.

SOURCE: The Indian Express

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