Alwaght- The US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF)said India should to be put on a religious freedom blacklist over a "drastic" downturn under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
USCIRF, in its annual report published on Tuesday, said India should join the ranks of "countries of particular concern" that would be subject to sanctions if they do not improve their records.
"In 2019, religious freedom conditions in India experienced a drastic turn downward, with religious minorities under increasing assault," the report said.
The bipartisan panel recommends but does not set policy, and there is virtually no chance the State Department will follow its lead on India, an increasingly close US ally.
But the lower ranking for the ally amounts to a stark show of disapproval of India's divisive new citizenship law, which the United Nations has called "fundamentally discriminatory".
Trump declined to criticize the law during his February visit to India, where his meeting with Modi was punctuated by the worst violence in decades in New Delhi, in which 53 people, mostly Muslims, were killed.
