Democratic Backsliding in India: Civil Liberties, Press Freedom and Institutional Decline

There has been marked conceptual shift in policies towards minorities and civil liberties under Modi government. The panel attempts to analyse these public policies, establishes a link between ongoing public discourse on religious minorities, and explains how it is influencing the functioning of various institutions towards minorities.
Panel evaluates three legislations, among many other such proposals by Modi govt, that exposes its anti-minority stance; Enemy Property Bill that attacks succession & property rights of Muslims; UCC which attacks personal laws; Citizenship (Amendment) Act which attacks citizenship rights. Also, it critically analyses the ban on slaughter houses, anti-conversion laws and Modi’s opposition to AMU’s minority character. It reveals the majoritarian stance of govt. Further, mis-and disinformation with regard to Muslim and Christian minorities is rampant in mainstream media, social media and political discourse encouraged by the political dispensation.
Panel underlines certain critical developments under Modi regime and its possible manifestations; such as cow vigilantism, beef ban, UCC, triple talaq, culture of intolerance, mob lynching, gharwapasi, love jihad, Islamophobia, iconization of anti-minority figures, majoritarianism, renaming the roads& towns etc. that may be linked to Muslim identity, changing history textbooks, portrayal of Muslims as the ‘Other’, spreading hatred against Muslims and Christians, hysteria in media, the bogey of ‘anti-national’ and seditioncharges etc. has direct correlation to the rise in right-wing Hindu cultural & religious nationalism/extremism.
Moreover, silence of the State needs to be understood. This majoritarianism emanates from RSS’ brand of Hindutva politics and weakens India’s foundation of secularism. The panel aims to develop a rigorous overview of the BJP’s policies on religious minorities by addressing certain critical issues. How the government, and the BJP’s sister and mass based organisations, are reframing and changing the constitutional, national, political as well as religious discourses on religious minorities in India?What are the impacts of BJP policies on national institutions for religious minorities such as the MMA and the NCM to name a few? How is it affecting the secular democracy in India and leading to discontents among religious minorities? Panel analyses how there has been decline in press freedom, civil liberties and robustness of institutions.