--------------------------------------------------------------------------- **** http://www.GOANET.org **** ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Happy New Year Twenty-Ten --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Santosh Helekar: The title of the Times of India news story and in its text thoroughly misleads readers in this regard. The excerpts in the post appended below does worse.India figures high only when you count the 25 most populous countries because of its very high social hostilities index and its population. Response: The Times of India report got the essence and gist of the Pew Report dead on. The Pew Report is all about global restrictions on religions covering 198 countries. It studies government restrictions on religions (GRR) and social hostility involving religion (SHR) and measures them on a scale of 1-10. India scores 5.1 in the GR Index and a high 8.8 on the SH Index. The Telegraph too carries a similar report. Refer link http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091231/jsp/nation/story_11927638.jsp Santosh Helekar: India figures very high only in the social hostilities index, which is obvious because this index is skewed by hundreds of deaths due to war, military action, and religious extremist, left-wing extremist and terrorist violence in places like the Northeast and Kashmir, as indicated in the Pew methodology. Response: Nowhere does the Pew Report suggest or even indicate that so far as India is concerned that India ranks high in the Social Hostility Index due to deaths caused by war, military action, left wing extremism or terrorist violence as the poster would like to mislead us into believing. It is the posters own interpretation and conclusion to divert our attention from the core issue viz. persecution of religious minorities. Refer pages 45 to 48 which details some of the incidents. Incidentally, out of the 7 states covered, 5 are/were BJP ruled staes and 2 are Congress ruled. This itself tells its own story. Here are some excerpts from the report pertaining to India vis-a-vis other countries: http://pewforum.org/newassets/images/reports/restrictions/restrictionsfullreport.pdf 1. Among all regions, the Middle East-North Africa has the highest government and social restrictions on religion, while the Americas are the least restrictive region on both measures. Among the world’s 25 most populous countries, Iran, Egypt, Indonesia, Pakistan and India stand out as having the most restrictions when both measures are taken into account, while Brazil, Japan, the United States, Italy, South Africa and the United Kingdom have the least. (pgs 2 & 3) 2. Under the GRR, India scores among the top 20% with a score of 5.1 . Under the SHR, India scores an extremely high of 8.8 to be counted among the top 5%. Other countries in this categoy in order of ranking are Iraq, Pakistan,Afghanistan,Indonesia,Bangladesh,Somalia,Israel,Sri Lanka,Sudan,Saudi Arabia. (pgs 22, 25 &28) The Pew Forum’s Social Hostilities Index is a measure of concrete, hostile actions that effectively hinder the religious activities of the targeted individuals or groups. 3. As the chart on page 28 shows, nearly all of the 50 most populous countries that are high on both measures of restrictions are in Asia or the Middle East-North Africa region. Many of the restrictions in these countries are driven by groups pressing for the enshrinement of their interpretation of the majority faith, including through Shariah law in Muslim societies and through the Hindutva movement in India, which seeks to define India as a Hindu nation. (Additional examples of restrictions on religion in India can be found on page 45 of the Methodology.) 4. The list of countries with very high levels of social hostilities differs considerably from the list of those with the most restrictive governments. Only one country, Saudi Arabia, appears on both lists.Several others that are very high in social hostilities also score in the high range on government restrictions; these include India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and Israel.(page 19). The report is a blessing in disguise for all of us Indians. We have the choice of using it as a wake up call to rectify the situation or bury it and pretend that all is well and hunky dory. It is upto each one of us to make the choice. Regards, Marshall