Dont you fact check Mr.Blinken? Based on dubious data fed by Christian evangelists, US govt criticises India on religious freedom

We all are aware of the anti-Indian orgnisation Indian American Muslim Council which has been notorious for engaging paid lobbyists to target India while collecting money in the name of helping the Muslim Community. So let’s not waste time over there, let"s have a look at the other players, starting with FIACONA.

NewsBharati    17-May-2023 17:24:54 PM
Total Views |
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has published a report on ‘atrocities’ on minorities, targeting India. It should be noted that, it has been flagging India as a ‘Country of Particular Concern’for consecutively the last three years.
 
Report
 
Multiple media outlets have also picked up the report, however, it seems like no one, including Secretary Antony Blinken, has looked into the religious freedom report. But before targeting India, Blinken should learn that the report is based on documentation of ‘atrocities on minorities’ by organizations – such as Islamic radical organisation, Indian American Muslim Council, Open Doors USA, International Christian Concern, Evangelical Fellowship of India, FIACONA, and United Christian Forum.
 
 
 
We all are aware of the anti-Indian orgnisation Indian American Muslim Council which has been notorious for engaging paid lobbyists to target India while collecting money in the name of helping the Muslim Community. So let’s not waste time over there, let's have a look at the other players, starting with FIACONA.
 
Federation of Indian American Christian Organizations of North America (FIACONA)
 
FIACONA is a US-based org founded by John Prabhudoss (2000) & is a member of the Coalition Against Genocide(Shaik Ubaid of ICNA/IAMC & Angana Chatterji of Fai fame). It started ‘documenting’ atrocities on Christians in India in 2021 whose data finds its way to @StateIRF report.
 
FIACONA has released 2 reports so far. It claims to have one of the most detailed documentation. Many Indian & foreign media covered its stories on ‘increasing atrocities on Christians in India’.
 
Recently, a representative group of Christian leaders protested at Jantar Mantar against rising Christian Persecution, citing the same database. Another delegation submitted a Memorandum to President Murmu demanding immediate attention. However, before going further let us check how significant its data is.
 
If we study its report we find out that its data is full of duplication, fabrications, and in some cases outright imagination. FIACONA has THREE different data on atrocities on Christians in India in a single report. In its 2023 report alone the figures change as: 1198 + hundreds (on page 8 of FIACONA report) 1198 + thousands (page 9) 30 Million (page 19).
 
 
 
Looking at its records, it seems like they have to be inspired by Jamaat fronts’ documentation of ‘atrocities’ on Muslims like DOTO & which is equally fake. FIACONA’s data doesn’t even have proper calculations. The total mismatches & same data reference changes next year! (DOTO was exposed by #DisInfoLab in 2021)
 
In FIACONA’s 2022 report about 53.6% of cases are based on 2 sources: EFI-RLC’s report (287) & witness-victims reports (120). But EFI in turn has no references. FIACONA also refers to Persecution.Org or International Christian Concern (ICC). But ICC’s reference is EFI!
 
FIACONA referred to EFI & ICC Report. ICC’s source is EFI! Guess who else uses EFI & ICC as its source? Open Doors! And US Commission on International Religious Freedom uses Open Doors & FIACONA data in its report.
 
Who will tell them that data isn’t a matter of faith?
 
A cursory look at the data shows the majority of ‘documented cases’ are duplicate entries. For example, the FIACONA Report 2023, declares UP and Chhattisgarh as states with some of the highest number of atrocities recorded against Christians. However, if one were to take a look into the report, single cases have been reported multiple times. An arrest of the pastor (Azamgarh) for violating the UP’s law against conversion has been reported in 10 different incidences.
 
 
 
What is Duplication?
 
If an incident is reported by 3 newspapers, it's counted as 3 atrocities. To this extent, every news related to Uttarakhand's anti-conversion law was recorded as an instance of atrocity against Christians. Shocking, Right?
 
That’s not all, what is more shocking is even cases where the civic authorities have acted against an unlawful/ illegal encroachment by Christian Missionaries/ pastors (Delhi, Rajasthan, MP, Gujrat & Tamil Nadu) these have been recorded as part of religious persecution. More than 50 cases are of family disputes, where the family members object to the conversion of a person. However, this is also recorded as a targeted atrocity against Christianity.
 
The report makes it obvious that it is written from a perspective of propaganda, as it is obsessed with the term “Hindu Nationalists” throwing accusations in practically every case. Moreover, if police booked any pastor even in a child sexual abuse case or for sexually abusing women, it is also an atrocity against Christians.
 
Even FIACONA members don’t believe their own stories. In a webinar held in 2020, FIACONA members boasted about the success of ‘increasing conversion’ in India. Ironically, in the same webinar, they stated their agenda of getting India blacklisted.
 
 
 
Open Doors
 
Apart from it, IRF also uses another org’s report, called Open Doors, which is also a Christian evangelical Organization. It releases World Watch List (WWL), ranking countries based on Christian survival difficulty. WWL enlists India among countries of ‘extreme persecution’ of Christians.
 
The data of Open Doors is ‘audited’ by members of the International Institute of Religious Freedom (IIRF)- another org led by evangelists. Open Door data is also used by USCIRF to rank countries. Predictably, it also collaborates with Islamist fronts IAMC, and JFA. It is worth noting that Open Doors uses a distorted map of India in its report and consistently labels India as a country of ‘special concern’.
 
Its data? Similar to FIACONA.
 
WWL claims ‘grassroots’ (sic) survey in 150 countries with 100 questionnaires. And then the data it provides is ‘symbolic numbers’! We found many discrepancies, like the Wrong fig of the Christian population, Mismatch in ranking & violence rate.
 
First of all the data compilation and ranking methodology of the World Watch List of Open Doors has its own set of discrepancies. For instance, according to their analytic report of 2023, the total Christian population of India is 69,494,000 against the total population of 1,406,632,000 (data given in the report until April 2022 taken from the World Christian Database). Going by their data, it makes the total percentage of the Christian population in India 4.94%.
 
What is the truth?
 
According to the census of 2011 of India, the population of Christians in India was 2.3%. Now, as per the population data of India until the first quarter of 2011, the total population of the country was 1210.19 million. This means that the Christian population then was approx. 27,834,370. Considering that this population rose by 50% in 2022, the total number still amounts to no more than 41,751,555. Even the total population of the country hasn’t risen even by 20% (16.23% between March 2011 and April 2022), let alone that of a single community.
 
 
 
Secondly, the violence rate per WWL and their corresponding ranking do not tally. Several countries with a lower violence rate are ranked higher, while countries with much higher numbers are given better grading. According to the table, the violence rate in Pakistan is 0.01% while in Sudan it’s 0.012 %. The violence rate in Sudan is more than Pakistan, yet Sudan is ranked lower at the 10th spot and Pakistan at the 7th.
 
 

Evangelical Fellowship of India
 
Open Doors’ report drew on a variety of sources, including reports from multiple organizations and news articles. And how much Open Doors’ report is credible, we found upon studying the key sources of information referred to by Open Doors. Apart from its methodologies, the ODI report referred to a number of sources which in turn has the taint of illegitimacy and one of them referred to was the Evangelical Fellowship of India (EFI).
 
Evangelical Fellowship of India (EFI) claims to be an umbrella organization of more than 65,000 churches in the Indian subcontinent. It is also a charter member of the World Evangelical Alliance. 
 
The Secretary General of EFI is Rev Vijayesh Lal, who has been associated with a Church and Religious Freedom in the Indian subcontinent for over two decades. As per his blog, Vijayesh Lal was the institute of Open Doors International (ODI) in India in 1999. He had the key representative of ODI in the Indian sub-continent and was serving as its Executive Director till December 2013.
 
Not surprisingly, the Open Doors report on India relies heavily on EFI data for documenting ‘atrocities on Christians in India’.
 
What about EFI ‘data’?
 
ODI report referred to a number of sources which in turn has the taint of illegitimacy and one of them referred to was the Evangelical Fellowship of India (EFI). EFI ‘documents atrocities on Christians in India, but the report is replete with stories having ZERO references. Most of the EFI inputs come from another organization: United Christian Forum (UCF) which uses a helpline number to document cases!
 
 
 
 
The entire report is replete with cases and stories but NONE of them have referred to any source of the news and incident. Further, the report uses a collage of several images. But not a single image infers to what incident was it taken from and not even the time and date stamp denoting its origin. Implying, that the usage of those pictures was implying that the usage of these pictures might just be for the sake of giving accessorial touch to the report to give an impression of credibility.
 
To recap, the basis of the IRF Report is Open Door and FIACONA, which in turn rely on a host of other documentation, which in circular evidence refer to each other. The data is almost deliberately fabricated.
 
 
 
IRF report also mentions Jamaat front IAMC. This is the first time that the IRF report referred to IAMC. Former USCIRF commissioner Nadine Maenza also joined IRF last year. Also, IAMC hired a firm owned by Maenza's friend for lobbying USCIRF against India in 2013. Worth noting that the Supreme Court quashed a PIL filed by these fronts accusing the ‘increasing atrocities’ on Christians in India. It is surprising why they were not reprimanded/ fined for such a frivolous PIL based on fabricated data.
 
What is shocking is that, in its report, IRF says that it can’t independently verify the reports of the organizations they utilize. Yes, you read it right! US-based Christian organisations and their Indian affiliates create fabricated data, which is lapped by media to build a narrative of Christian atrocities – which is then used by the US Govt religious watchdog to target India – from a US national security perspective!
religious freedom US United States India