Overview of human rights abuses and violations against India’s religious minorities from 1 January to 31 December, 2025.
Key Figures (2025)
STATE ACTORS
- 23+ killings of Muslims by state actors. (21 in 2024, 20 in 2023)
- Dozens of Muslims maimed in continuing ‘half encounter’ shootings in UP.
- 3000+ Muslims detained or arrested in Kashmir after Pahalgam attack; 1000+ more after Delhi car bombing.
- Several thousand Bengali-Muslims and Rohingya refugees detained or arrested nationwide in crackdown on ‘illegal immigrants’. 1880+ forcibly expelled to Bangladesh, including 200+ Indian citizens, from May-August. 2000+ more expelled from Assam alone from October-December.
- 265+ Muslims arrested nationwide, mostly in UP, over peaceful ‘I Love Muhammad’ affirmation campaign.
- ~300 Muslims arrested in Assam alone under cow protection laws.
- ~100 Muslims arrested in Assam alone for social media posts following Pahalgam attack and Delhi bombing.
NON-STATE ACTORS
- 27 Muslims (and 1 Dalit) killed by Hindu extremist non-state actors in suspected religiously-motivated hate crimes. (15 Muslims killed in 2024, 25 in 2023)
- 2 Muslims die by suicide following violence and/or harassment by Hindu extremists.
- 26+ episodes of targeted mass violence against Muslims, across 13 states.
- 200+ Muslims injured in violent assaults by Hindu extremists in other contexts.
2025 marked the further entrenchment of patterns of religious discrimination that have steadily consolidated since the ascension of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Now in the twelfth year of uninterrupted Hindu nationalist rule, India’s minorities—particularly Muslims—continued to be systematically targeted through law, policy, and other everyday exercises of state power that stripped them of security and dignity, and rendered the promise of equal belonging increasingly fragile.
State actors continued to deploy a long-documented—and expanding—repertoire of coercive practices against Muslims, including by killing and maiming them in staged police ‘operations’, torturing and detaining them en masse, bulldozing their homes, livelihoods, and places of worship, and forcing families out of long-held settlements without rehabilitation. New practices also emerged, with the government launching a large-scale, nationwide crackdown on Bengali-speaking Muslims, including Indian citizens, who were detained, denationalised, separated from their families, and ‘pushed’ across the border at gunpoint after being accused of being ‘illegal migrants’. India’s once-celebrated electoral machinery was also repurposed as a tool of exclusion, through an unprecedented nationwide voter re-verification drive that has already resulted in the mass disenfranchisement of Muslims in Bihar and is now being rolled out across the country.
At the same time, the country’s top political leadership, led by Prime Minister Modi, continued to cast Muslims as ‘infiltrators’, criminals, and demographic threats—language echoed daily by India’s mainstream media networks and popular cinema. Hindu supremacist foot soldiers operated across villages, towns, and cities with widening impunity, significantly stepping up violent attacks against Muslims and, increasingly, Christians. Despite the accumulation of these abuses, the BJP continued to notch up impressive electoral victories in major states, reinforcing concerns that the systematic mistreatment of minorities has become an accepted—if not rewarded—feature of governance.
As India enters 2026, its persecution of religious minorities shocks as much by its routinisation as by its scale and cruelty, having become, as observers have been warning, a dangerous new normal. With elections looming in multiple crucial states, amid deepening economic distress and waning international credibility, the incentives for further polarisation—and the risks for minorities—appear to be escalating.
In this annual edition of the India Persecution Tracker, we provide an overview of these trends for the year 2025.
The data presented here is not exhaustive, only those reported in media and verified by them. Given the fast-shrinking space for reporting human rights abuses, by journalists and HRDs in the country, the data presented here is certainly only a sample of the total. Yet it does help in providing a pattern, that in itself is note-worthy. Below some highlights from the report.
- States ruled by BJP-led governments (Uttar Pradesh and Assam) and regions marked by conflict (Kashmir) witnessed the most serious abuses by state actors, including extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests and detentions, and torture and ill-treatment. In 2025, we documented the killings of 23 Muslims—up from 21 in 2024, and 20 in 2023—in incidents involving police, armed forces, or other state security personnel. These included cases in in Jammu & Kashmir (where at least 8 Muslim civilians were shot dead), UP (which recorded its highest ever fatalities in ‘encounter’ shootings, including at least 6 Muslims), and Assam (where, amid the largest-ever forced eviction drive against Bengali-speaking Muslims, authorities shot dead one more Muslim, in the eighth such killing since 2017).
Alongside, India’s Adivasis, particularly in Chhattisgarh, bore the brunt of the deadliest year of counterinsurgency operations in recent memory, with security forces claiming to have killed over 275 Maoists—many of whom are alleged to be Adivasi civilians—through the year.
- BJP-allied Hindu supremacist militant groups like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal (BD) continued to enjoy a free rein, across the country and particularly in BJP-governed states (such as UP and Bihar). Members of these outfits continued to harass, intimidate, assault and murder religious minorities, particularly Muslims, on various pretexts. In 2025, Hindu extremists murdered at least 27 Muslims (and a Dalit), in religiously-motivated hate crimes, an 80% increase from 2024, when 15 such killings were recorded. 9 of these killings involved violence by members of organised cow vigilante groups and/or following mob accusations related to cattle theft, while at least 5 of the victims (4 Muslims and a Dalit) were murdered shortly after being accused by their assailants of being ‘Bangladeshis’ and ‘illegal immigrants’, against the backdrop of the Indian government’s ongoing xenophobic campaign against Bengali-speaking Muslims. At least 26 episodes of targeted mass violence against Muslims were reported, across 13 states, along with hundreds of individual assaults and non-fatal religiously-motivated hate crimes.
- The Pahalgam attack in April and subsequent military conflict with Pakistan provided the pretext for authorities across the country to arbitrarily detain and arrest thousands of Muslims—including civilians in Kashmir, as well as academics, activists, and migrant workers elsewhere in the country. Thousands of Bengali-speaking Muslims were rounded up from across India—and in Gujarat and Assam, their settlements summarily demolished—and at least 1880, including around 200 Indian citizens, were forcibly expelled to Bangladesh without due process, under a new ‘push back’ policy. This was also the context in which over 40 Rohingya refugees from Myanmar, including women, children and a cancer patient, were detained in Delhi, flown to the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, and forcibly expelled at sea. In Assam—where state authorities introduced a new SOP to expedite the denationalisation and expulsion of Bengali-speaking Muslims—Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma claimed at the end of the year that over 2000 ‘foreigners’ had been expelled in just the last three months.
- Fuelling these abuses was the continued proliferation of hateful, anti-minority rhetoric by senior BJP leaders and state officials, led by PM Modi, who continued to refer to India’s Muslims as ‘infiltrators’ and other pejoratives, particularly ahead of state elections in Bihar in November. Other senior leaders of the BJP as well as powerful Hindu religious figures continued to make open calls to expel, boycott, assault, and murder Muslims. BJP allies Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal, and other similar groups, kept the communal pot boiling further at the local level by organising hundreds of anti-minority hate congregations across the country, and dozens of events where participants were distributed weapons and trained in their use.
Ahead of upcoming state elections, high levels of local mobilisation were reported from Assam and Uttar Pradesh. In Assam, the Chief Minister claimed Hindus are in a ‘last battle for survival’ and declared that he ‘wanted the situation to be explosive,’ while local ethnonationalist groups were reported going door-to-door conducting ‘citizenship verification’ drives targeting Muslims. In UP, where hundreds of Muslims were arrested since September after peacefully affirming their devotion to their Prophet, the Chief Minister issued a warning that ‘Yamaraj’—the Hindu god of death—is waiting for alleged criminals, and an influential Hindu cleric called on his followers to form ‘suicide squads’ against Muslims.
- At the policy level, India’s Parliament introduced sweeping and discriminatory legislative changes that could undermine the autonomy of Muslim religious and charitable endowments (waqfs) across the country and pave the way for the state takeover of property owned and used by Muslim communities for centuries. BJP states also continued to openly discriminate against Muslims in access to education and livelihoods, while intensifying efforts to culturally marginalise them. The conditions for religious freedom remained dire, especially in states where anti-conversion laws—which were introduced in two more states—are systematically weaponised against Muslims and Christians. The targeting of Muslims, both by state and non-state actors, also continued to be fuelled by cow protection laws that are now in place in 20 of India’s states, with many now having provisions that empower violent ‘vigilante’ groups to function in a quasi-official manner and assist with enforcement, with impunity. Alongside, BJP-ruled state governments continued to brazenly carry out punitive demolitions and evictions targeting Muslims and their property, in violation of Supreme Court directives in 2024 mandating due process.
- Indian authorities also intensified their targeting of journalists and independent media, civil society organisations, academics, and other political dissenters.
- India’s domestic mechanisms—including its police, judiciary, NHRI (which now faces an unprecedented downgrade by GANHRI), election authorities, and the media—continued to fail to ensure that minority victims, who face entrenched, identity-based obstacles at every stage of the remedial process, can access any meaningful avenue of redress. Indeed, instead of functioning as safeguards against majoritarian abuse, they appear to have become its active enablers.
- Alongside, Indian authorities have also intensified their targeting of journalists and independent media, civil society organisations, academics, artists, performers, and other political dissenters, while pro-government news outlets broadcast an unprecedented barrage of disinformation, with wide-ranging regional implications. (Shrinking Civic Space & Democratic Backsliding)
Throughout the year, some international actors, including UN bodies and experts, continued to raise alarm about the deteriorating situation facing India’s minorities:
- The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, at the 60th Session of the Human Rights Council, highlighted India’s recent deportation of Rohingya Muslims as an example of the normalisation of policies and practices that violate the rights of migrants and refugees.
- The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) acted under its Early Warning and Urgent Action (EWUA) and sent an Action Letter highlighting India’s mistreatment of Bengali-speaking Muslims in Assam.
- UN Special Procedures (SP) mandate-holders issued two joint public statements: In June, three mandate-holders called on India to halt its practice of arbitrary and punitive demolitions disproportionately targeting Muslim communities, which they described as ‘an aggravated form of human rights violation’. In November, 10 mandate-holders condemned the range of violations reported in Kashmir and against Muslims in general in the aftermath of the Pahalgam attack, noting that such excesses can ‘fuel social division and grievances that can spiral into further violence.’
Other key allegation letters sent to the Indian government by UN Special Procedures through the year included those highlighting concerns over the waning independence and impartiality of India’s Supreme Court (February); the widespread and arbitrary detention of Rohingya and Chin refugees from Myanmar, (March), and the ‘unconscionable’ forced expulsion of Rohingya refugees at sea (May); continuing instances of lynchings and other forms of physical violence against Muslims by Hindu vigilante groups (July); and the discriminatory legislative changes concerning the regulation of Muslim waqfs (September). - The US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), the autonomous one-of-a-kind FoRB institution, recommended, once again, that India be designated as a Country of Particular Concern. USCIRF also released a mid-year podcast on deteriorating religious freedom in India, and an Issue Update on systematic religious persecution in India, including an examination of the relationship between the BJP and its affiliate groups operating under the Hindu supremacist Sangh Parivar network.
- Several human rights watchdog bodies continued to raise concerns in 2025 too. Human Rights Watch published reports on India’s expulsion of Muslims to Bangladesh, and the risk of renewed ethnic violence in Manipur. Amnesty International published a report legislative changes enacted by India to consolidate its regulation of immigration and foreigners. Coalitions of international CSOs issued multiple joint statements, including on the continuing incarceration of Umar Khalid, among other HRDs, and India’s worsening engagement with international human rights mechanisms.
In 2025, Muslims across multiple states were killed by state actors in a range of contexts including security operations, staged police ‘encounters’, eviction drives, in custodial settings, and due to other uses of lethal force. At least 23 Muslims were killed during the year in incidents involving police, armed forces, or other state security personnel, with cases documented in Jammu & Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Delhi, Bihar, and Haryana.
The largest number of killings was recorded in Jammu & Kashmir, where at least eight Kashmiri Muslim civilians died in the context of security operations marked by allegations of custodial torture, enforced disappearance, staged ‘encounters’, and systematic cover-ups. In Uttar Pradesh, at least six Muslims were killed in confirmed cases of police ‘encounters’ in 2025. At least five other Muslims died in police custody or shortly after detention across four other states, with families alleging torture and denial of medical care. Additional killings occurred during eviction operations and in other contexts involving the use of lethal force by state actors, including the deaths of two Muslim children.
In 2024, we had documented 21 extrajudicial killings of Muslims by state actors. 20 such killings were documented in 2023.
In 2025, Jammu & Kashmir continued to witness killings of Muslim civilians in the context of security operations by Indian forces. Families across cases disputed official versions of events and alleged custodial torture, enforced disappearance, staged ‘encounters’, and systematic cover-up attempts.
Reported cases included:
- 5 February, 2025 (Kathua, Jammu & Kashmir): Makhan Din, a 25-year-old labourer from the Gujjar Muslim tribal community, died by suicide after recording a video alleging that he had been detained and tortured by police who accused him of having links to militants. In the video, Din swore on the Quran that he had no such ties and stated that police forced him to make a false confession. Shortly after being allowed to return home to retrieve his phone, he consumed poison and died while being taken to hospital. Police denied all allegations of torture and announced a magisterial and departmental inquiry. The victim’s family alleged they received no updates and that no arrests had been made.
- 6 February, 2025 (Baramulla, Jammu & Kashmir): Waseem Ahmad Mir, a 32-year-old truck driver, was shot dead by the Indian Army after allegedly failing to stop at a checkpoint. Army officials claimed they fired at the truck’s tyres following a chase. A doctor who operated on the victim reportedly stated that the fatal bullet entered through Mir’s back. The victim’s family insisted that he had no prior criminal record and posed no threat. A formal investigation was initiated, but key materials, including CCTV footage and the FIR, were reportedly not shared with the family.
- 13–15 March, 2025 (Kulgam, Jammu & Kashmir): The bodies of two brothers, 25-year-old Riyaz Ahmad Bajad and 18-year-old Showkat Ahmad Bajad, were recovered from the Veshaw River nearly a month after they went missing following a wedding. Riyaz’s body reportedly bore signs of torture, including burns, blisters, and neck injuries, though preliminary post-mortem findings cited drowning. The family disputed this account and alleged foul play. Protests demanding justice were met with police violence; video footage showed a police officer kicking women demonstrators. Police stated that an investigation was ongoing.
- 25 April, 2025 (Bandipora, Jammu & Kashmir): Altaf Hussain Lali, a daily-wage labourer from Kolnar Ajas, was killed in what the Indian Army described as an anti-militancy operation following the Pahalgam attack. The victim’s family alleged that Lali had been taken into police custody two days earlier for questioning regarding his brother, a former militant, and was last seen alive at Hajin Police Station. The family further alleged that Lali was buried in an unmarked grave without their consent. Authorities claimed that Lali was killed in a firefight while guiding security forces to a militant hideout.
- 4 May, 2025 (Kulgam, Jammu & Kashmir): The body of 22-year-old Imtiyaz Ahmad Magray was found in a stream two days after he was allegedly taken into custody by the Indian Army. Locals alleged custodial killing. A purported Army statement, circulated locally but not officially released, claimed that Magray died by suicide after jumping into a river while guiding troops to a militant hideout.
- 31 May, 2025 (Srinagar, Jammu & Kashmir): Ali Mohammad Joo, an artisan, was fatally run over by a police vehicle in Bemina while walking home with his daughter, who was also injured. Eyewitnesses alleged that the vehicle did not stop after impact and crushed his chest. Police initially attempted to attribute the death to a heart attack, prompting protests. An FIR was later registered under provisions relating to rash driving and criminal negligence.
- 24 July, 2025 (Jammu, Jammu & Kashmir): Mohammad Parvez, a 21-year-old Gujjar Muslim, was shot dead during a police operation in Jammu’s Phallain Mandal area. Police claimed the death occurred in a ‘cross-firing’ incident with suspected drug traffickers. Eyewitnesses and family members alleged that Parvez was fired upon without warning at a roadside checkpoint and described the killing as a staged ‘encounter’. Two police officials were reportedly suspended and a magisterial inquiry ordered, though no findings had been made public at the time of writing.
Across these cases, families alleged torture, enforced disappearance, and procedural violations, including delayed or withheld FIRs, lack of access to post-mortem reports, and opaque investigations. These incidents illustrate a continuing pattern of impunity for security forces operating in Jammu & Kashmir. (Also see section on Right to Effective Remedy.)
In 2025, Uttar Pradesh police continued to rely extensively on ‘encounters’ (a colloquial term used to describe staged police shootings of alleged criminals, routinely justified as acts of self-defence or retaliatory force) and ‘half encounters’ (when such shootings result in grievous injury but not death) as routine instruments of law enforcement. Media reports indicated that least 48 people were killed in police ‘encounters’ in the state this year, the highest annual toll since the current government led by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath assumed power in 2017.
While the state does not routinely publish a reliable religious breakdown of those killed in ‘encounters’, and media coverage of such incidents continues to diminish, analysis of previously released government data has confirmed that Muslims are disproportionately killed in ‘encounters’. As of September 2024—when the cumulative death toll since March 2017 stood at 207—government figures indicated that over 32 percent of those killed were Muslims, despite Muslims constituting only approximately 19 per cent of the state’s population. The latest available government data further indicates that the cumulative death toll had risen to 266, in over 16,248 such shootings (called ‘operations’), which also resulted in injuries to 10,990).
No updated disaggregated data has been released for 2025, though available media reporting suggests that Muslims continue to be prominently represented among those killed or maimed, particularly in districts with large Muslim populations. Some reported cases included:
- 18 May, 2025 (Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh): A Muslim man identified as Salman was shot dead and two others injured in a police ‘encounter’ over alleged cow smuggling. Police claimed the suspects fired during a chase and that police returned fire in self-defence; police said the suspects had earlier rammed a van into a police official who later died of injuries.
- 6–7 November, 2025 (Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh): A Muslim man identified as Waqif was killed in an alleged ‘encounter’ in the Raunapar area. Police claimed he opened fire instead of surrendering; media reports described him as wanted in multiple cases, including alleged cow trafficking, robbery, and murder.
- 30 November, 2025 (Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh): A Muslim man identified as Mohammad Parvez was brought to hospital with bullet injuries, after police initially described the injuries as a road traffic accident and later stated he was injured in an alleged ‘encounter’ linked to a ‘cow trafficking’ case. A government emergency medical officer publicly disputed the police’s ‘accident’ characterisation after examination. His condition was reported as critical. Police later attributed the confusion to Parvez allegedly reporting an accident himself.
- 10 November, 2025 (Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh): Two Muslim men identified as Asif and Dinu were killed in a joint operation by Meerut Special Task Force and Moradabad Police. Police stated the men were both wanted criminals who were injured in an exchange of fire and declared dead at hospital.
- 20–21 December, 2025 (Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh): A Muslim man identified as Zubair was killed in an alleged ‘encounter’ during a vehicle check. Police claimed he was a wanted criminal who opened fire, sparking a gunfight; he was taken to hospital and declared dead.
- 20–21 December, 2025 (Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh): A Muslim man identified as Siraj Ahmad, described as an accused in the 2023 murder of a Sultanpur-based lawyer, was killed in an alleged encounter near Salarpur. Police said he opened fire and was injured in retaliatory firing, later dying during treatment in hospital.
These ‘operations’ have been publicly celebrated by both the state government and senior police officials as evidence of a ‘zero tolerance’ approach to crime, including most recently in December 2025, when Chief Minister Adityanath warned alleged criminals: ‘Yamaraj (The Hindu god of death) will be waiting for you at the next crossroads, to cut your ticket to hell, and your path to hell is decided.’
On 17 July 2025, Sakowar Ali, a 19-year-old Bengali-origin Muslim, was shot dead and several others injured when police opened fire on residents protesting an eviction drive in the Betbari area of Goalpara district. The protest erupted after officials used bulldozers to dig up a road connecting a temporary settlement of families recently evicted from the Paikan Reserve Forest.
Witnesses and local student groups alleged that the police used live ammunition without warning or restraint. Authorities described the firing as ‘retaliatory action’ against ‘miscreants.’
Ali’s mother has written to the Chief Justice of the Gauhati High Court seeking an independent judicial probe, calling the incident an ‘unprovoked and disproportionate use of force.’
Since 2016, at least eight Bengali-origin Muslims have been killed in police firing during eviction operations in Assam.
In 2025, at least five Muslim men died in police custody or shortly after detention under circumstances involving allegations of torture, denial of medical care, and procedural violations. In multiple cases, families alleged attempts by police to mischaracterise the cause of death or delay registration of complaints.
- 20 January, 2025 (Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh): Mohammad Irfan, a 45-year-old Muslim fruit vendor and heart patient, died in police custody at the Raisatti police outpost after being detained in connection with a family dispute. His family alleged that police assaulted him, denied him access to prescribed heart medication, and prevented him from taking his medicines while being taken into custody. Police denied the allegations and claimed Irfan died of cardiac arrest, warning against the spread of ‘rumours’.
- 1 May, 2025 (Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh): The family of Salman, an 18-year-old Muslim youth, alleged that repeated police harassment and torture drove him to suicide. According to relatives, Salman was detained and beaten daily for nearly ten days in connection with a missing person inquiry, threatened with jail, and extorted for bribes despite no evidence of wrongdoing. His body reportedly bore extensive bruises. Police denied custodial abuse; one officer was reportedly suspended and an internal inquiry announced.
- 3 June, 2025 (Delhi): Zubair Ahmad Bhat, a 30-year-old Kashmiri Muslim from Srinagar, died after being detained by Delhi Police. His family alleged that he was beaten with rods in custody and targeted for being Kashmiri; in text messages sent shortly before his death, Bhat reportedly described being assaulted by police. Delhi Police denied wrongdoing and claimed he died of a drug overdose. No FIR had been registered at the time of reporting.
- 2 August, 2025 (Siwan, Bihar): Faiz Anwar, a 20-year-old Muslim youth, died in police custody two days after his arrest in connection with an old theft case. Police claimed he fell ill and later died by suicide. His family alleged custodial torture and deliberate killing, stating that Anwar’s body bore visible injuries and deep marks on his neck suggesting strangulation. Relatives further alleged that police denied them access during detention, attempted to move the body without informing the family, withheld the post-mortem report, and failed to register a formal complaint. No judicial inquiry or suspension of officers had been initiated at the time of writing.
- 8–9 October, 2025 (Mewat, Haryana): Jameel, a 50-year-old Muslim man from Luhinga village, died after being taken into police custody following an assault by private individuals. According to family members and eyewitnesses, Jameel was alive but seriously injured when police arrived at the scene; instead of taking him to hospital, police allegedly took him to the police station, where he later died. The family alleged that Jameel was further assaulted in custody. Police initially refused to register an FIR, prompting protests by villagers, before later registering a murder case against private assailants. Police have not issued a clear public explanation regarding the cause of death.
Across these cases, families alleged custodial violence, denial of timely medical care, intimidation, delayed or withheld FIRs, and lack of independent investigation, raising persistent concerns regarding compliance with India’s legal obligations in custodial death cases.
In 2025, the deaths of at least three other Muslims—including two children—were attributable to the violent actions of state actors. Reported cases included:
- 2 March, 2025 (Alwar, Rajasthan): A one-and-a-half-month-old Muslim infant was reportedly crushed to death during an early-morning police raid at her family’s home in Raghunathgarh village. According to the family, police entered the house without prior notice or a warrant while attempting to apprehend her father, a daily-wage labourer. An officer allegedly stepped on the infant, who died on the spot. The raid was part of Operation Antivirus, a cybercrime crackdown in the Mewat region, which residents allege has disproportionately targeted Meo Muslims. At least five police officers were reportedly booked; no electronic evidence was recovered from the residence.
- 3 April, 2025 (Cooch Behar, West Bengal): Jahanur Haque, a 24-year-old Muslim farmer and migrant labourer, was reportedly shot dead by Border Security Force (BSF) personnel while on his way to water his crops. According to a complaint filed by his family with the NHRC and local authorities, BSF personnel forcibly stripped Haque to verify his religion, assaulted him, and shot him in the lower torso and head. His body was reportedly left unattended for nearly six hours, with locals prevented from reaching him. The BSF labelled Haque a smuggler. An FIR was registered, but no action against the accused officers had been reported at the time of writing.
- 29 November, 2025 (East Delhi, Delhi): Sahil Ansari, a 14-year-old Muslim boy, was shot dead by an off-duty Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) constable during a wedding procession in Shahdara. Witnesses stated that Sahil was slapped and shot after picking up currency notes thrown during the procession. The accused, a CISF constable posted in Uttar Pradesh and attending a relative’s wedding while on leave, was arrested and booked for murder.
2025 marked the deadliest year of anti-Maoist operations by Indian security forces in recent memory. By the end of the year, authorities reported killing at least 275 alleged Maoists in Chhattisgarh alone, with additional killings reported across Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, and Maharashtra. While security forces uniformly described those killed as armed members of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist) insurgent group, families, civil society groups, and journalists continue to allege that many victims—of whom most were Adivasis—had been detained beforehand, tortured in custody, and killed in staged ‘encounters’.
The most lethal phase of counter-insurgency was reported between May and June 2025, when security forces killed at least 50 people across Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh in a series of large-scale operations. Families repeatedly alleged that identities of the deceased were withheld, post-mortems were conducted in their absence, and that bodies were unlawfully cremated under police supervision, often at night and without consent.
Further ‘encounters’ were also reported in November and December.
The Maoist insurgency, a non-international armed conflict between government forces and left-wing militants, has been raging in several provinces for decades, with Chhattisgarh being the epicentre in recent years. Violence in that state has spiked since late-2023, when the BJP assumed power in the state, with hundreds killed in similar operations since then, many of whom are alleged to have been civilians. More than one-third of the alleged Maoist cadres killed since 2024 are reported to be women.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah reiterated the government’s stated aim to ‘wipe out’ Maoism by March 2026. The latest onslaught has continued despite offers from the CPI (Maoist) leadership—most recently in November 2025—to renounce weapons and accept rehabilitation by February, while requesting a halt to security operations in the interim. To date, there has been no official acknowledgement or investigation of the recent allegations of custodial torture, staged ‘encounters’, or unlawful cremations in the context of the insurgency.
In July 2025, a group of UN Special Procedures mandate-holders—on freedom of religion or belief; cultural rights; minority issues; and summary executions—issued an allegation letter to India highlighting reports of 300+ such killings since 2014, disproportionately of Muslims. The experts expressed concern that impunity for such violations has ‘generated cycles of repression,’ and noted that States may be held responsible for the conduct of non-State actors if they fail to exercise due diligence to prevent, investigate and respond to such conduct.
In 2025, authorities across the country continued to arbitrarily arrest or detain Muslims on a wide range of spurious and discriminatory grounds. As in previous years, arrests were frequently carried out in masse, in the aftermath of security incidents or episodes of communal violence, and under the cover of overbroad executive directives and national security laws. Key trends and patterns that emerged or intensified during the year included:
Throughout 2025, custodial torture and ill-treatment of Muslims remained a persistent feature of policing across India. Non-fatal police shootings in the form of ‘half-encounters’ in Uttar Pradesh continued to be a visible manifestation of this pattern. Reports from across the country also documented the continuation of a broader range of previously identified, highly communalised forms of abuse, disproportionately targeting Muslims.
A June 2025 report by REDRESS highlighted the normalisation of custodial torture in India and the lack of effective safeguards for victims. Complementing these findings, a May 2025 report by SAJC documented recurring patterns of custodial violence specifically targeting Muslims. The report found that Muslim detainees were routinely subjected not only to severe physical abuse, but also to degrading treatment that explicitly targeted their religious identity, including being forced to chant Hindu religious slogans or mocked for religious identity-markers and practices.
Throughout 2025, Hindu extremist actors continued to engage in organised, targeted mass violence against Muslims across multiple states. While many of these episodes were described as ‘communal riots’ or ‘communal clashes,’ they frequently involved one-sided attacks on Muslim neighbourhoods, homes, places of worship, and livelihoods, followed by selective or disproportionate state action against Muslim communities.
We documented at least 26 discrete episodes of communal violence and unrest across 13 states, including incidents involving targeted assaults, arson, property destruction, forced displacement, and coercive policing measures. Across these episodes, at least five deaths were reported (Nagpur: one Muslim; Murshidabad: two Hindus and one Muslim; Bhadrak: one person of unidentified religion), alongside hundreds of injuries, and widespread destruction of Muslim-owned homes, businesses, and religious sites in multiple states. (Another monitoring initiative, by Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, documented 28 ‘communal riots’ in 2025; due to methodological differences, our monitoring is not comparable.)
Maharashtra (multiple violent clashes, one Muslim fatality, post-violence mass arrests and demolitions), Madhya Pradesh (recurrent festival- and rumour-triggered violence followed by disproportionate arrests of Muslims), and Gujarat (repeated attacks on Muslim neighbourhoods, parading of detainees, and post-violence demolitions) together accounted for the highest concentration of incidents involving mass violence and punitive state action against Muslims. Assam (violence clashes in Dhubri followed by shoot-at-sight threats and targeted arrests of Muslims, and year-long coordinated ethnonationalist campaigns targeting Bengali-speaking Muslims) and Uttar Pradesh (escalating Hindu supremacist mobilisation, chronic low-intensity violence and targeting of Muslim religious sites, along with multiple recurring forms of coercive policing) too continued to be critical hotspots even in the absence of frequent large-scale violence in 2025.
Major trends and spikes in reported episodes of targeted mass violence and communal unrest in 2025 included:
- Violence amid Holi and early-year Hindu religious processions (February-March 2025): In February and March, multiple incidents of communal violence were reported during or around Hindu religious processions. In Jamui (Bihar) on 16 February, clashes broke out during a Hanuman Chalisa procession passing a mosque, leaving at least six people injured and prompting an internet shutdown. In Hazaribagh and Giridih (Jharkhand), clashes during Maha Shivratri and Holi processions resulted in at least 20 injuries, arson, and vehicle burning. In Unnao (Uttar Pradesh), Hindu youths attacked Muslim homes during Holi celebrations, hurling stones and shouting communal slurs. Similar procession-linked violence was recorded in Punjab (Ludhiana) and Madhya Pradesh (Guna).
- Violence amid Ramadan and Eid ul-Fitr (March-June 2025): In Ahmedabad (Gujarat) in early March, Muslims returning from Ramadan prayers were attacked with stones; some, including children, were forced to chant Hindu slogans at knifepoint. In Mhow (Madhya Pradesh) on 9 March, celebrations following India’s cricket victory escalated into communal violence outside a mosque, resulting in injuries, arson, and arrests—12 of the 13 arrested were Muslims.
In Dhubri (Assam) on 8–9 June, alleged cattle remains found near a temple triggered large-scale unrest in a Muslim-majority district. Prohibitory orders were imposed, and at least 60 people were arrested—all Muslims, despite reports of violence from both communities. Earlier, in Khargone (Madhya Pradesh) on 17 June, alleged cow sacrifice during Eid al-Adha led to arrests of Muslim men and calls by Hindu groups for mass FIRs and bulldozer demolitions. In Nainital (Uttarakhand) on 30 April, rumours following the arrest of a Muslim man triggered mob attacks on Muslim shops and a mosque, with police declining to register FIRs against attackers. - Spike in violence in West Bengal following Waqf (Amendment) Act: Communal violence erupted in multiple localities of Murshidabad district on 11 and 12 April amid protests against the Waqf (Amendment) Act. At least three people were killed (two Hindus and one Muslim), a 12-year-old Muslim boy sustained life-threatening injuries from gunfire, and hundreds were displaced. The violence included widespread arson, looting, and targeted attacks across both Hindu and Muslim neighbourhoods. In Betbona, a Muslim-majority locality, at least 113 homes were destroyed by masked individuals.
- Spike in violence triggered by social media incitement and interfaith relationships (January-May 2025): Several episodes of violence in this period followed allegations involving interfaith relationships. In Purnia (Bihar) on 13 January, a mob of around 100 attacked and torched Muslim homes after a Hindu woman eloped with a Muslim man, despite official confirmation that the relationship was consensual. In Vidisha and Ujjain (Madhya Pradesh), Hindu mobs attacked Muslim homes and vehicles following viral videos or accusations involving Muslim youths, with police detaining Muslim men while taking no action against perpetrators of arson.
- Ethnonationalist mobilisation and mass violence against Bengali-speaking Muslims in Assam (July 2025 onwards): In July, Bengali-speaking Muslims in Upper Assam faced coordinated campaigns of intimidation and violence by Hindu nationalist and Assamese ethnonationalist groups. At least nine incidents of assaults, forced evictions, and vigilante ‘citizenship checks’ were documented between 19 and 30 July, following large-scale state eviction drives. Families were beaten, denied shelter, and threatened with expulsion in what organisers openly described as a ‘Miya kheda andolan’ (‘drive out Miyas’ movement).
- Violence related to the ‘I Love Muhammad’ campaign and subsequent repression (August-September 2025): The peaceful ‘I Love Muhammad’ affirmation campaign by Muslims, which triggered heavy-handed policing in UP and other states (see section on Arrests & Detentions), was also marked by communal violence. In Bahiyal (Gujarat) and Davanagere (Karnataka), Muslim neighbourhoods and shops were attacked following online mobilisation by Hindu nationalist actors.
- Spike in violence Hindu during Ganesh Chaturti and Durga Puja period (September-October 2025): The extended Hindu festival season once again provided a recurring backdrop for mass violence. In Maddur (Karnataka) and Yavat (Maharashtra), processions and social-media rumours led to stone-pelting, arson, and injuries. In Cuttack (Odisha) in early October, Durga Puja idol immersion processions escalated into large-scale violence in Muslim-majority localities: dozens of mostly Muslim-owned shops were torched or vandalised, Muslim residents were assaulted, and videos circulated showing Muslim street vendors being forced to chant Hindu slogans.
- Year-end escalation in violence: In Haldwani (Uttarakhand) on 16 November, false rumours of cow slaughter—later conclusively debunked by CCTV footage—triggered mob attacks on Muslim-owned shops, eateries, and vehicles. Violence continued even after police clarification. Around 50 people were booked, with limited arrests, while a BJP-linked influencer who issued public calls for mobilisation was briefly detained and released on bail. In Veraval (Gujarat) on 11 November, protests against the demolition of a dargah escalated into clashes, with police using tear gas and lathi charge and booking at least 17 named Muslim residents under rioting and public-order offences.
As in previous years, many of these episodes followed a familiar pattern: Hindu extremist mobilisation, often anchored to religious festivals or processions, was followed by attacks on Muslim homes, businesses, and places of worship; Muslims were then subjected to selective or disproportionate arrests; authorities imposed coercive measures such as curfews, internet shutdowns, mass FIRs, or demolitions; and instigators and perpetrators linked to Hindu nationalist groups continued to enjoy near-total impunity.
Throughout 2025, Muslims across India continued to be subjected to widespread, individualised hate crimes and violent assaults by Hindu extremist actors. These incidents—distinct from episodes of mass communal violence—were typically one-sided, targeted attacks on identifiable Muslim individuals or small groups, often accompanied by ritualised humiliation, religious coercion, and police complicity or inaction.
At least 200 Muslim individuals were assaulted, injured, or otherwise physically targeted in such hate crimes across more than a dozen states, media reporting of which is now dwindling. Victims included cattle and meat transporters, students, migrant workers, clerics, journalists, vendors, professionals, women, and children. Many were attacked in public spaces, at workplaces, or inside their homes.
Cow-protection vigilantism remained the single most recurrent trigger, accounting for a substantial share of assaults across states such as Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana, and Chhattisgarh. Victims—who were mostly Muslims, but also included Dalits—were frequently stripped, tied up, beaten with rods or sharp weapons, and handed over to police, who in many cases registered counter-cases against the victims under cow-protection laws.
A second major cluster involved attacks linked to inter-religious relationships or fabricated allegations of ‘love jihad’, including assaults at courts, educational institutions, and private residences. Muslim men were routinely targeted merely for being seen with Hindu women, registering interfaith marriages, or socialising across religious lines.
Incidents involving public religious profiling and coercion were also common, with victims forced to chant Hindu religious slogans, subjected to public humiliation, or assaulted for refusing to comply. Children were among those attacked in multiple instances, including minors assaulted by mobs, teachers, and peers in explicitly religiously-charged contexts.
Geographically, the highest concentration of reported incidents continued to emerge from BJP-governed states, particularly Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Haryana, though serious assaults were documented across non-BJP states as well. Kashmiri Muslims faced a pronounced spike in attacks and forced displacement following the Pahalgam attack, with students and migrant workers targeted across multiple states within days. Bengali-speaking Muslims too faced a parallel spike in violent attacks. Across regions and contexts, a consistent feature of these assaults was impunity: perpetrators were often linked to Hindu extremist organisations; police frequently delayed or refused registration of FIRs; religious motives were downplayed or denied; and victims were often arrested instead.
In the third quarter of 2025, Muslims across nine states faced over 25 documented incidents of violent assault and intimidation. The victims included cattle and meat traders, transporters, drivers, clerics, students, and children, with many attacked in public or at their workplaces. A significant number of assaults (at least eight) were linked to self-styled gau rakshak (cow protection) vigilantes, while others stemmed from fabricated allegations of ‘love jihad,’ public religious profiling, and participation in Hindu festivals. At least two minors—a seven-year-old boy in Uttarakhand, who was assaulted by his teachers, and a 14-year-old girl in Haridwar, who was sexually assaulted by a group of Hindu youth—were among those attacked. Several victims were tied up, forced to chant Hindu religious slogans, or publicly humiliated, continuing the pattern of ritualised, identity-based violence documented in previous quarters.
Although these cases represent only a fraction of those likely to have occurred, they indicate the persistence and spread of anti-Muslim hate crimes across India amid declining media coverage.
Some reported cases included:
- On 12 July in Ratlam (Madhya Pradesh), Hindu Jagran Manch members stormed a hotel and disrupted a birthday party involving Muslim youths and Hindu girls, accusing them of ‘love jihad’ and later surrounding a police station in protest. The same evening in nearby Jaora, another Muslim youth was beaten by a mob after visiting a Hindu girl’s home; police detained the victim but took no action against the attackers.
- On 14 July in Belagavi (Karnataka), the local head of the Hindu nationalist group Sri Rama Sene allegedly conspired to poison a government school’s water supply to have its Muslim headmaster transferred. Police arrested three people, including the group’s district-level leader, on charges of endangering life and culpable homicide.
- In early August, at least violent incidents linked to the Hindu kanwar yatra pilgrimage were reported in Uttar Pradesh. In Soron (Kasganj), Bajrang Dal and VHP members assaulted a Muslim man over false claims of selling beef; police filed an FIR against the assailants. In Lakhimpur Kheri, Kanwar devotees attacked a Muslim driver and vandalised his car after it brushed against a pilgrim, injuring five people.
- On 1 August in Durgapur (West Bengal), a group of Muslim cattle traders were tied up, humiliated and beaten by Bharatiya Janata Party workers accusing them of cow smuggling and calling them ‘Bangladeshis’. Police registered a case, arrested two suspects, and named a BJP youth wing leader as the main accused.
- On 7 August in Kasganj (Uttar Pradesh), a Muslim youth was beaten by members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal over false allegations of carrying beef. Police rescued the victim and later filed an FIR against two named and six unidentified assailants, though Hindu groups protested to have the case withdrawn.
- On 9 August in Agra (Uttar Pradesh), members of the Bajrang Dal stormed a hotel, dragged out an interfaith couple, and publicly assaulted the Muslim man while police stood by without intervening. An FIR was filed, but no arrests had been made at the time of reporting.
- On 10 August in Haridwar (Uttarakhand), a 14-year-old Muslim girl was allegedly sexually assaulted and then thrown from the terrace of a house by three Hindu youths. The girl sustained serious injuries and was admitted to hospital. Police forces were deployed to the area due to the ‘communally sensitive’ nature of the case. An FIR was registered.
- On 14 August in Surat (Gujarat), a 26-year-old Muslim man was brutally assaulted by unidentified men while travelling to Delhi for work and later denied treatment at multiple hospitals in Delhi-NCR.
- On 15 August in Pauri Garhwal (Uttarakhand), a Muslim man was assaulted by three men for refusing to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’ on Independence Day. Police registered an FIR under multiple sections and arrested all three accused after a video of the attack went viral.
- On 16 August in Srinagar (Uttarakhand), a Muslim railway worker was beaten by three men who forced him to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’ and threatened to cut his beard; a police complaint has been filed.
- On 16 August in Nayagaon (Uttar Pradesh), two Muslim men were beaten by a mob on suspicion of theft while returning from a religious procession. Police rescued the victims and later registered a case against five named accused and around 50 others after the mob attacked the local station and damaged vehicles.
- On 26 August in Agra (Uttar Pradesh), cow vigilantes attacked a Muslim truck driver and his relatives, vandalising their vehicle on false suspicions of carrying beef. Police rescued the victims and registered a case against 10–12 unidentified members of Bajrang Dal and other groups.
- On 21 August in Muzaffarnagar (Uttar Pradesh), a young Muslim man was brutally attacked by a mob with sharp weapons in Barla village, sustaining critical injuries. Despite community outrage and demands for accountability, police had not registered an FIR or issued any statement at the time of reporting.
- On 27 August in Hapur (Uttar Pradesh), three Muslim youths were beaten by a mob with rods and sticks after being asked their names and identified as Muslims. Police registered a case naming four accused and said the matter was being treated as serious.
- On 6 September in Bankura (West Bengal), a 60-year-old Muslim hawker, Maimur Ali Mandal, was stabbed in the neck and stomach by three men who allegedly tried to force him to chant a Hindu religious slogan. Police called the attack criminal rather than communal, but the victim maintained he was targeted for refusing the slogan.
- On 14 September in Haridwar (Uttarakhand), a 7-year-old Muslim boy was beaten by two teachers at a government school in Jhabrera for missing a day of class, sustaining a fractured hand. Police registered an FIR.
- On 22 September in Aligarh (Uttar Pradesh), a mosque imam, Maulana Karim Mustaqim, was brutally assaulted by local men who pulled his beard and skullcap and forced him to chant Hindu religious slogans. The attackers allegedly called him religious slurs beat him with sticks and rods. Police denied any communal motive, describing it as a ‘simple assault.’
- On 22 September in Belagavi (Karnataka), members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal stopped a truck suspected of carrying beef, assaulted the driver, and set the vehicle on fire. Police arrested nine people—three for transporting the meat and six for arson and assault—and registered separate cases.
- On 23 September in Kushinagar (Uttar Pradesh), a Muslim man named Azharuddin was tied with ropes and brutally beaten by a mob after a parking dispute with a Hindu youth. Videos showed him being dragged and thrashed in public as onlookers filmed the assault.
- Throughout September and early October, several incidents were reported across India of Muslims being attacked or humiliated for attending the Hindu Navratri festival’s garba dance events. In Sagar (Madhya Pradesh), a Kashmiri student was beaten by members of Hindu nationalist groups for joining the celebration; in Kota (Rajasthan), two Muslim women were denied entry despite holding valid passes; and in Jagdalpur (Chhattisgarh) and Adoni (Andhra Pradesh), Muslim men were dragged, forced to bow before Hindu idols, and made to chant Hindu religious slogans.
The United Christian Forum (UCF), a Christian advocacy group, documented 706 ‘incidents of violence’ against Christians across India as of November 2025, following 834 in 2024. UCF identified Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh as the principal hotspots and noted that allegations of forced or fraudulent conversion remained the most common pretext for attacks.
According to UCF, ‘incidents’ throughout the year included physical assaults, disruption of worship, threats, social exclusion, vandalism, and denial of burial rights, with formal police cases registered in only a small minority of instances, reflecting a persistent accountability gap. UCF further warned that anti-conversion laws, now in force in 13 states, continue to be systematically misused, often through third-party complaints and without evidence of coercion.
The final quarter of 2025 saw a marked escalation in severity and visibility, particularly in central and eastern India. In Chhattisgarh, burial-related disputes intensified into organised mob violence: in Kanker district (December), mobs torched churches and Christian homes, vandalised prayer halls, and injured more than 20 police personnel following objections to Christian burial rites. UCF recorded 23 burial-related incidents nationwide in 2025, 19 of them in Chhattisgarh, compared with around 40 such cases in 2024.
Similar patterns were documented in Odisha and Jharkhand, where Christian families were denied burial in common or private land, subjected to forced exhumations, pressured to renounce their faith, or driven out of villages, often amid administrative inaction. Several incidents involved collective decisions by village councils barring Christian burial practices or restricting Christian presence.
Anti-Christian mobilisation also spiked during the Christmas period. Reported incidents included the vandalism of Christmas decorations and prayer sites in Raipur (Chhattisgarh), attacks on Christmas gatherings in Madhya Pradesh and Assam, harassment of carol groups (including minors) in Kerala, and protests and intimidation targeting churches in Uttar Pradesh. In multiple cases, attacks occurred in the presence of police or without effective intervention. In a letter in late-December addressed to the Prime Minister, UCF warned that the cumulative pattern of violence—combined with the selective enforcement of anti-conversion laws and routine failure to register FIRs—has fostered fear, insecurity, and social exclusion, particularly among Adivasi and Dalit Christians.
Large-scale unilateral expulsions and refoulement of Bengali-speaking Muslims and Rohingya refugees after Pahalgam attack
In the aftermath of the 22 April 2025 terrorist attack in Pahalgam, Indian authorities launched a nationwide campaign of mass detentions, forced expulsions, and cross-border ‘pushbacks’ targeting Muslims, principally Bengali-speaking Muslims accused of being ’illegal immigrants’ from Bangladesh, and Rohingya refugees from Myanmar. These actions were largely carried out without due process, frequently without formal deportation orders, and in clear violation of India’s obligations under international human rights law, including the prohibition of refoulement.
From early May, police and border authorities across multiple states—most notably Assam, but also Delhi, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal—detained thousands of Bengali-speaking Muslims on suspicion of being undocumented migrants. Many were transferred to ‘holding centres’ or detention facilities and subsequently ‘pushed back’ across the India-Bangladesh border, often at night and without any prior judicial determination of nationality.
While Indian government authorities are yet to release consolidated data, Bangladeshi government data indicates that 1,880 individuals were expelled by India between 7 and 3 July through at least 22 border points in multiple states. These reportedly included around 100 Rohingya refugees from Myanmar, who had been inmates of the Matia ‘transit camp’ in Assam. A significant number of those expelled were later identified as Indian citizens – by mid-June, over 110 people were reportedly returned to India by Bangladeshi authorities. Media reports in July indicated that nearly all those subjected to these ‘pushbacks’ were Muslims, and that the number of those returned to India had reached around 200. In early 2026, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma claimed that his state alone had expelled over 2000 ‘foreigners’ in just the last three month.
Families repeatedly reported that relatives were forcibly taken from their homes or workplaces, denied access to lawyers, and removed without notice. In several instances, deportees, including elderly women, were allegedly transported by police or the Border Security Force (BSF) to the border, handed Bangladeshi currency, and ordered to cross at gunpoint. Others were left stranded for days in ‘no man’s land’ between the two countries, without food, shelter, or medical assistance.
Despite formal diplomatic protocols requiring nationality verification and coordination with the receiving state, these expulsions were carried out unilaterally. Bangladesh’s Foreign Ministry publicly protested the practice.
Assam, where a BJP-led government is seeking re-election in March-April 2026, emerged as the epicentre of the post-May expulsion drive. Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma celebrated the ‘pushback’ policy, invoking a February 2024 Supreme Court order (concerning only a limited number of ‘declared foreigners’), as well as the Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act, 1950 (a law originally enacted in response to post-Partition migration from erstwhile East Pakistan; and had been in effect for only months before being suspended), to justify these mass expulsions. In September, the Assam Cabinet approved a new Standard Operating Procedure under the 1950 Act, empowering district-level authorities to summon suspected foreigners, demand proof of citizenship, and issue expulsion orders—often within 24 hours—bypassing Assam’s Foreigners’ Tribunals altogether. In November and December, district authorities in Sonitpur and Nagaon districts were reported issuing multiple expulsion notices directing individuals declared foreigners to ‘remove themselves from India’ within 24 hours, while simultaneously ordering deletion of their names from electoral rolls, cancellation of their Aadhar cards, and withdrawal of all state benefits. In late-August, CM Sarma indicated that the number of individuals expelled from that state alone had surpassed 450, and that ‘at least 35-40 people’ were being ‘pushed back’ every week. In early-January 2026, Sarma claimed that his state had expelled over 2000 ‘foreigners’ in the final quarter of 2025, and that it would be possible to expel as many as 50000 a year under the new SOP.
Legal experts warned that this framework in Assam eliminates even the minimal procedural safeguards previously available under the FT system and vests sweeping quasi-judicial powers in the executive. Reports indicate that many of those targeted had pending appeals and disputed citizenship claims, while others had lived in Assam for decades.
By mid-2025, multiple detailed accounts emerged of individuals who had been expelled to Bangladesh and later returned after being identified as Indian citizens. These included elderly women, long-term residents, and individuals with documented family ties in India. Media reports documented physical abuse, intimidation, denial of food and medication, and prolonged periods of enforced disappearance. Several more such cases surfaced publicly in late November and December, after relatives traced missing family members through media footage or cross-border contacts. In some instances, Indian authorities agreed to facilitate return only after court intervention and political pressure, framing repatriation as a ‘humanitarian’ concession rather than acknowledging wrongful expulsion.
Alongside the targeting of Bengali-speaking Muslims, Indian authorities also carried out forced deportations of Rohingya refugees, including UNHCR-registered asylum seekers, in actions amounting to refoulement.
In early May 2025, police in Delhi detained over 40 Rohingya refugees, including women, children, elderly persons, and individuals with serious medical conditions, ostensibly for biometric verification. Instead, detainees were reportedly transferred to a detention facility, denied contact with families, and within days flown by military aircraft to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Survivors and family members reported that they were subsequently blindfolded, handcuffed, placed aboard an Indian naval vessel, and forced into the sea near the Myanmar coast, with life jackets, and ordered to swim ashore.
Independent investigations corroborated these accounts. The refugees reportedly landed in Myanmar, where they faced grave risks from armed conflict, military persecution, and trafficking networks. Their current whereabouts remain uncertain.
These deportations occurred shortly after the Supreme Court dismissed an urgent plea seeking protection for Rohingya refugees, characterising the allegations as ‘a beautifully crafted story’ and declining to intervene. Subsequent hearings later in the year saw senior judges—including the Chief Justice of India—publicly questioning whether refugees or undocumented migrants were entitled to due process, food, shelter, or protection from arbitrary expulsion.
The post-May expulsions were reportedly triggered by central government instructions issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs on 2 May, directing states to expedite identification and deportation of ‘illegal immigrants.’ Subsequent reporting suggested that these instructions authorised state police units to initiate deportations without prior diplomatic clearance, transfer detainees directly to the BSF, and carry out ‘pushbacks’ without FIRs or meaningful hearings. In December 2025, the Union Home Minister publicly articulated a ‘detect, delete, deport’ policy in Parliament, explicitly linking the deportation drive to the ongoing Special Intensive Revision of voter rolls in multiple states (see section of Disenfranchisement & Denationalisation), and framing ‘illegal immigrants’ as a demographic threat.
India continued to witness escalated religious polarisation and organised anti-Muslim mobilisation throughout 2025, particularly during state-level elections and national security flashpoints. This mobilisation continued to be driven and normalised by the country’s top political leadership, amplified by other senior BJP leaders, and reinforced by Hindu extremist non-state actors operating with routine impunity. A nationwide ‘detect, delete and deport’ campaign targeting Bengali-speaking Muslims provided an additional pretext for renewed harassment and violence, including in Assam and Uttar Pradesh ahead of crucial upcoming elections. As documented in the previous section (see Torture), these dynamics repeatedly translated into real-world harm, while institutional responses remained marked by inertia and a persistent lack of accountability.
Across the patterns documented above, a constant feature—as in previous years—was the near-total absence of meaningful accountability, with the advocacy of religious hatred against Muslims continuing to be met with institutional inertia and, increasingly, overt legitimisation by the country’s top political leadership.
Repeat offenders, at all levels, continued to evade meaningful accountability. In April, a judicial directive to finally register an FIR against Kapil Mishra—now a Cabinet Minister in the Delhi government, and a central figure in anti-Muslim incitement in Delhi in February 2020—was stayed at the request of the Delhi Police. At the same time, prominent hate preachers with a documented history of inciting violence and discrimination were openly rewarded: in January, Sadhvi Ritambhara was conferred one of India’s highest civilian honours, despite a decades-long history of anti-Muslim and anti-Christian rhetoric.
This pattern has persisted despite a longstanding Supreme Court directive requiring state-level authorities to intitiate suo motu action regarding instances of hate speech. There are no known instances of such action being taken against major perpetrators in 2025. The Court itself has signalled an increasingly restrained posture. In November, it stated that it could not ‘monitor every small incident’ of hate speech, emphasising that police stations and High Courts were more appropriate forums for redress. Analysts noted that this marked a remarkable retreat from the Court’s earlier recognition of hate speech as a structural threat to equality, dignity, and public order, and from its own characterisation of preventing hate crimes as the State’s ‘sacrosanct duty.’
In addition to the grave abuses detailed in the previous sections, 2025 was also marked by the continued adoption of discriminatory laws and coercive state practices by BJP-led governments at both the national and state levels. Throughout the year, authorities expanded the use of legal, administrative, and regulatory tools to reshape India’s electoral process, restrict religious freedom, and regulate or undermine Muslims’ access to economic, social and cultural rights. These developments unfolded against the backdrop of a broader pattern of democratic backsliding and sustained constriction of civic space.
In 2025, a nationwide Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls conducted by the Election Commission of India (ECI)—beginning in Bihar and subsequently expanded to at least nine other states and three Union Territories—triggered large-scale disenfranchisement of marginalised communities, with Muslims among the worst affected. Evidence emerging from multiple states indicates that the exercise has also disproportionately impacted women, migrant workers, and economically marginalised voters, particularly in districts characterised by high mobility, poverty, and minority concentration.
In Bihar, the SIR was conducted between June and September 2025 as an unprecedented, documentation-heavy re-verification drive carried out over a compressed 100-day period ahead of Assembly elections held on 6 and 11 November. When the final electoral rolls were published on 30 September, the electorate stood at 74.2 million, down from 78.9 million at the start of the exercise – a net reduction of nearly 4.7 million voters. Independent analyses comparing the final roll with official population projections identified a ‘democratic deficit’ of approximately 8.3 million age-eligible adults missing from the rolls, reversing decades of steady expansion of Bihar’s electorate. Multiple independent assessments confirmed that the Bihar SIR disproportionately impacted Muslims: while Muslims constitute around 17.7 percent of the state’s population, they accounted for roughly one-third of all deletions from the final rolls, with exclusion rates highest in poor, migrant-heavy, and Muslim-concentrated districts.
Following Bihar—where the BJP-led governing alliance subsequently secured a decisive victory, winning 202 of 243 seats—the Election Commission of India (ECI) extended the SIR to several other states, including opposition-governed West Bengal, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu, where the process remains ongoing and is scheduled to conclude ahead of upcoming Assembly elections. Across these states, opposition parties and civil society actors have warned that the SIR—by empowering election officials to flag ‘suspected foreigners’ and refer cases to citizenship authorities—is also functioning as a de facto citizenship screening mechanism, echoing features of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise in Assam that excluded 1.9 million people in 2019.
The SIR has been particularly contentious in West Bengal, where media reports documented widespread fear among Muslims of disenfranchisement and expulsion, amid official rhetoric—both from the BJP and the ECI—framing the exercise as a means to identify ‘infiltrators’ and ‘illegal immigrants.’ The revision has unfolded against the backdrop of the intensifying, xenophobic political campaign targeting Bengali-speaking Muslims, alongside the continuation of unilateral cross-border ‘pushback’ expulsions, further reinforcing perceptions that the SIR is being deployed in a discriminatory and punitive manner. (See sections on Arrests & Detentions; Forced Expulsions & Refoulement; Advocacy of Religious Hatred).
Note: For more on the Bihar SIR, and the integrity of the post-SIR Assembly elections in that state, see analysis by the Independent Panel for Monitoring Indian Elections’ (IPMIE) here and here.
Throughout 2025, authorities across BJP-governed states continued to carry out demolitions and forced evictions that either explicitly punished Muslims accused of wrongdoing or disproportionately impacted Muslim communities. These actions persisted despite Supreme Court interventions in September and November 2024, which stayed demolitions lacking prior judicial approval and laid down detailed due-process requirements, including advance notice, opportunity for hearing, and reasoned legal justification.
Demolition drives continued to be framed by authorities as routine enforcement against ‘encroachments’, ‘illegal constructions’, or as part of ‘redevelopment’ and forest protection. In practice, however, these drives continued to be marked by selective application against Muslims, often as collective punishment, and large-scale procedural violations, with severe humanitarian consequences. Major punitive demolitions and eviction drives in 2025 included:
- Assam: The Assam government intensified its long-running, large-scale forced eviction drive that has targeted Bengali-speaking Muslims. Media and official figures indicated that by mid-2025, at least 17,600 families had been evicted since 2016, with the pace accelerating sharply under CM Himanta Biswa Sarma. Over 5,000 Bengali-speaking Muslim families were reportedly displaced in a roughly 45-day period in mid-2025 alone. Major drives during the year included the demolition of 700+ homes in Goalpara (late June), the eviction of 1,000+ families from the Paikan forest area (12–17 July), the displacement of around 1,400 families in Dhubri to clear land for a proposed power project (8 July), and the removal of 2,000+ families in Golaghat (29 July). In November, forest authorities resumed eviction operations in western and central Assam, demolishing 588 homes in Goalpara. Another large-scale demolition drive was reported in Nagaon district, affecting over 1500 families, following earlier notices to vacate land designated as reserve forest. Across districts, locals and civil society observers continued to report that the eviction drives exclusively targeted Muslim settlements, including in areas where neighbouring non-Muslim habitations on government land were left untouched. Throughout the year, senior state officials led by CM Sarma framed the evictions as necessary to counter a purported ‘demographic invasion’ and ‘land jihad’ by Muslims. Media reports continued to document severe humanitarian consequences, including mass homelessness during monsoon and winter months, loss of livelihoods and crops, destruction of schools, and widespread disruption to children’s education, with little evidence of meaningful rehabilitation.
- Gujarat: In March, municipal authorities in Ahmedabad demolished the homes of six Muslim men arrested in connection with mob violence in Vastral, carrying out the demolitions under heavy police presence within days of the arrests and citing alleged ‘illegal encroachment’. In April–May, following the Pahalgam attack, state authorities launched a series mass demolitions in Muslim-majority settlements around Chandola Lake and Bapunagar in Ahmedabad, demolishing over 10,000 homes after detaining more than 1,000 residents—most of them Muslims—on suspicions of being ‘illegal Bangladeshis’, despite later verification that the vast majority were Indian citizens. In October, after communal violence during the Hindu Navratri festival, district authorities in Bahiyal village bulldozed nearly 200 Muslim-owned houses and shops following arrests and public parading of Muslim residents, with officials framing the action as an anti-encroachment drive. Similar punitive patterns were reported the same month in Gir-Somnath, where 11 Muslim-owned houses, shops, and a dargah were demolished near Somnath following police action, and in Nadiad, where a Muslim-owned house used for a prayer meeting was bulldozed shortly after a conversion-related raid.
- Jammu & Kashmir: In the immediate aftermath of the 22 April Pahalgam attack, security forces demolished at least nine residential houses belonging to alleged militants’ families across Anantnag, Pulwama, Kulgam, Shopian, Bandipora and Kupwara districts (24–27 April), reportedly without prior notice and, in several cases, using explosives that damaged neighbouring homes. Officials quoted in media reports described the demolitions as intended to ‘send a message.’ The pattern continued later in the year, including the overnight demolition of a family home in Pulwama linked to a doctor suspected of involvement in the November 2025 Delhi blast, and the demolition of a journalist’s decades-old family home in Jammu days after his reporting on alleged police corruption, leaving his elderly parents and minor children homeless at the onset of winter.
- Uttar Pradesh: In the fourth quarter of the year, following the 26 September ‘I Love Muhammad’ protests and subsequent police crackdown in Bareilly (see Arrests & Detentions), local authorities initiated a coordinated series of demolitions, sealings, and eviction notices targeting Muslim-owned properties allegedly linked to cleric Maulana Tauqeer Raza—who had led the protest call—and his associates. Actions included demolition notices to at least 27 Muslim-owned homes, sealing and partial demolition of multiple residential and commercial buildings, and the 23 November bulldozing of a two-storey commercial market housing around two dozen Muslim-run shops. Residents reported that notices functioned as final orders issued without meaningful opportunity to be heard, despite long-standing possession and payment of property taxes. While the Supreme Court and Allahabad High Court later intervened to restrain further coercive action, these orders came only after demolitions had already taken place.
Other, smaller-scale punitive demolitions continued to be reported from BJP-governed states throughout the year: in Bijaynagar (Rajasthan) in February, municipal authorities issued demolition-related notices targeting the families of Muslims accused in an alleged sexual assault case framed by local Hindu groups as ‘love jihad,’ also extending action to a local mosque and graveyard before the High Court ordered a status quo; in Malvan (Maharashtra) in February, authorities demolished a Muslim family’s home and business days after their son was accused of raising ‘anti-national’ slogans following an India–Pakistan cricket match; in Damoh (Madhya Pradesh) in March, officials bulldozed structures belonging to members of the Muslim Qasai community after cow-slaughter allegations; and in Nagpur (Maharashtra) in March, the home of a Muslim political leader accused of sedition was razed following communal violence.
Other demolition and clearance drives—also officially framed as anti-encroachment or redevelopment drives—also continued to have disproportionate and discriminatory impacts on Muslim communities: in Ujjain (Madhya Pradesh) in January, authorities demolished a mosque and 257 homes in a predominantly Muslim locality as part of a temple-corridor project, with residents reportedly receiving less than 12 hours’ notice; in Bet Dwarka (Gujarat) the same month, a week-long drive in Balapar village razed over 330 structures—including more than 300 homes and multiple religious sites—amid heavy police deployment, with community leaders alleging that Muslim properties were disproportionately targeted; in Surguja (Chhattisgarh) later that month, forest officials razed around 60 homes of Muslim migrant workers days after a minister alleged encroachment on government land. In Pune (Maharashtra) from February onwards, a sweeping municipal ‘anti-encroachment’ drive demolished over 5,000 shops and warehouses, reportedly leaving thousands of Muslim traders and workers without livelihoods; and in Gurugram (Haryana) in March, large-scale demolitions in migrant settlements were carried out with minimal notice, with Bengali-speaking residents particularly impacted.
Notably, in Bengaluru in opposition-governed Karnataka, authorities carried out an eviction and demolition drive in the Kogilu–Yelahanka area in December, clearing nearly 200 makeshift homes in predominantly Muslim, migrant settlements on land earmarked for a municipal solid-waste project. Unlike patterns documented in BJP-governed states, the Congress-led government publicly denied punitive intent, cited prior notices and environmental risk, and announced limited rehabilitation measures under a state housing scheme. Locals and civil society groups, however, disputed the adequacy of notice and the manner and timing of the demolitions.
In June, a group of UN Special Procedures mandate-holders, including the Special Rapporteur on Housing, had issued a press statement urging the Indian government to halt the continued use of arbitrary and punitive demolitions targeting minorities, low-income households, and migrants. The experts noted that such demolitions constitute aggravated human rights violations, particularly when carried out without due process and in a discriminatory manner. They expressed alarm at the scale of recent demolitions in Gujarat and criticised the use of vague justifications such as ‘national security’ and ‘illegal immigrants’ to bypass legal safeguards. Separately, the SR on Housing noted that India is ‘leading the world in illegal home demolitions, especially affecting minorities and vulnerable groups’, characterising the trend as ‘a national scandal’ and a ‘gross violation of India’s own laws and international law’. In early October, the Chief Justice of India, while speaking at a public event in Mauritius, claimed that India’s legal system is governed by ‘the rule of law, not the rule of the bulldozer,’ citing the Supreme Court’s 2024 judgment. Yet, as the developments highlighted above show, authorities across multiple BJP-governed states continue to brazenly deploy bulldozers as instruments of collective punishment against Muslims.
In early April, India’s Parliament passed the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, over strong opposition protest, bringing sweeping changes to the governance of Muslim religious endowments (waqfs). While Prime Minister Narendra Modi hailed the enactment as a ‘watershed moment’, Muslim organisations, opposition parties, and legal experts described the legislation as a serious threat to minority rights and religious freedom.
Waqfs are religious or charitable endowments under Islamic law, typically involving the permanent dedication of property for the benefit of the Muslim community; once established, waqf properties cannot be sold or repurposed for non-religious use. Each Indian state has a Waqf Board responsible for managing such properties. The new Act introduces changes that significantly curtail the autonomy of Muslim communities in managing these endowments.
Among the most contentious provisions is the abolition of ‘waqf by use’, a doctrine that previously allowed mosques, graveyards, and shrines to be recognised as waqf based on historical community usage even without formal deeds, a move that now puts undocumented heritage sites at risk of state takeover. The Act also permits the inclusion of non-Muslims on Waqf Boards, an unprecedented step not applied to other religious communities and seen by critics as undermining the constitutional guarantee that all religious denominations have the right to manage their own religious affairs. Under the Act, decision-making power over property disputes is shifted to state-appointed officials, effectively making the state a judge in cases where it may itself claim the land. The Act centralises control by empowering the central government to issue binding regulations, conduct audits, and restructure Waqf Boards.
In July, the central Minority Affairs ministry issued the Rules operationalising the Act through a centralised digital regime requiring time-bound registration and verification of all waqf properties by district authorities.
The enactment of the law triggered protests across several states. In Uttar Pradesh, hundreds of Muslims were served preventive notices and ordered to furnish ‘peace bonds’ for silently opposing the Act during prayers. In West Bengal, protests in Murshidabad escalated into violence resulting in three deaths and mass arrests; subsequent fact-finding by civil society groups and a Calcutta High Court–appointed panel described the violence as organised and politically motivated, documented arbitrary raids and detentions in Muslim localities, and noted serious police and administrative failures.
In September, the Supreme Court stayed the operation of several key provisions of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, including clauses empowering state officials to determine land status or unilaterally alter waqf and revenue records. The Court held that such powers violated the principle of separation of powers and directed that no waqf be dispossessed until ownership disputes are finally decided by the Waqf Tribunal or higher courts. It also capped non-Muslim representation on Waqf Councils and directed that chief executive officers of Waqf Boards should, ‘as far as possible’, be drawn from the Muslim community, while upholding the prospective abolition of ‘waqf by use’. Constitutional challenges to the Act remained pending at the end of 2025.
In September, in a letter to the Indian government, the UN Special Procedures mandate-holders on religious freedom and minority rights jointly warned that the Act’s effective implementation could have ‘significant implications’ for India’s ability to uphold freedom of religion or belief and expressed concern over a broader ‘pattern of systematic targeting and discrimination’ against religious minorities. They cautioned that the law appeared to place Islamic institutions under ‘heightened state control and reduced autonomy.’
Note: For more detailed analysis, see SAJC’s briefing note ‘The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025: Legal, constitutional, and human rights concerns’
In September 2025, the Supreme Court consolidated all pending challenges to India’s provincial-level anti-conversion laws—now in force in 13 states—and directed governments to file responses. These statutes claim to prohibit religious conversions by force, fraud, and other unlawful means, but are widely criticised for undermining religious freedom and enabling the arbitrary suppression of minorities’ legitimate religious activity. Even as constitutional review remained pending, BJP-governed states continued to expand the scope and severity of these laws, normalising criminal, administrative, and property-related sanctions around personal belief, worship, and conversion:
- In September, Rajasthan enacted the Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2025, prescribing punishments of up to life imprisonment and steep fines, exempting conversion to one’s ‘original religion’, and authorising property seizure and demolition based on allegations by ‘any person’. The law, which came into force in October following gubernatorial assent, defines conversion broadly to include persuasion ‘by marriage, temptation or deceitful means’, and requires prior declarations and inquiries for voluntary conversion. Analysts described it as the most draconian anti-conversion statute enacted in India, warning that it formalises punitive practices previously carried out extrajudicially.
Christian organisations reported a marked increase in attacks on churches and prayer meetings in the state following the law’s passage, with numerous reports of pastors being assaulted assaulted, gatherings disrupted, and arrests made on allegations—made by Hindu supremacist groups—of unlawful. As documented in previous years, in several incidents, police arrested victims rather than perpetrators. - In August, the Uttarakhand cabinet approved amendments to the state’s existing anti-conversion law expanding criminal liability to all online ‘propaganda’ relating to religious conversion. Analysts warned that the amendment collapses the distinction between coercion and expression, allowing any online post, message, or creative content referencing interfaith relationships or religious coexistence to be treated as a criminal offence, and granting authorities sweeping discretion to police digital speech about faith.
Throughout the year, anti-conversion laws continued to be abused to restrict the peaceful exercise of religion in several BJP-governed states. Illustrative cases included the arrest of Catholic nuns and detention of Adivasi minors in Chhattisgarh, raids by Hindu supremacist groups on Christian gatherings in Jharkhand, and repeated arrests of Christians in Uttar Pradesh, often following interventions by Hindu extremist groups and without evidence of coercion.
A UN Special Procedures allegation letter in 2023 had flagged various infirmities in India’s anti-conversion laws, which mandate-holders noted are ‘likely to be used as a tool of persecution by those who are genuinely opposed to religious tolerance, ‘causing further polarisation and generating an atmosphere of fear among religious minorities.’ Anti-conversion laws were also flagged by the UN Human Rights Committee in its July 2024 Concluding Observations on India.
Throughout 2025, authorities in several BJP-governed states imposed restrictions that curtailed Muslims’ ability to manifest their religion publicly, including through worship, observance, commemorations, and peaceful devotional expression. These measures—often justified on grounds of ‘law and order’, public security, or regulatory compliance—were applied selectively and disproportionately to Islamic religious practices, narrowing the space for visible Muslim religious life.
- In Uttar Pradesh, police in multiple districts prohibited prayers in public spaces or on rooftops ahead of Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-al-Adha, warning of punitive consequences such as cancellation of passports and driving licences. Authorities denied permission for longstanding Muslim fairs and commemorations, including the Neja Mela in Sambhal, the Jeth Mela in Bahraich, and multiple Urs ceremonies in Ayodhya and Barabanki, citing security concerns even where such events had been held for centuries. Mosques in Sambhal were reportedly ordered to cover façades ahead of Holi celebrations, and local police issued orders prohibiting Muslims from offering namaaz prayers even on their terraces.
In September, police across UP—and in some other BJP-governed states—launched a coordinated crackdown on Muslims participating in the ‘I Love Muhammad’ campaign, a peaceful affirmation of faith ahead of Eid Milad-un-Nabi. Authorities treated the public display of the slogan as a law-and-order threat, registering mass FIRs, carrying out arrests, and, in some locations in UP, sealing or demolishing Muslim-owned homes and shops. (see section on Arrests and Detentions) - In Jammu and Kashmir, authorities continued to bar congregational prayers at Srinagar’s Jama Masjid and Eidgah grounds for major Islamic occasions, marking seven successive years of blanket prohibitions. Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, the mosque’s chief cleric, was repeatedly placed under house detention without formal notice, preventing him from leading prayers.
- Authorities in other states also relied on generally applicable laws—such as noise-pollution rules, cattle-slaughter regulations, and municipal by-laws—to disproportionately restrict Muslim religious practices. In Maharashtra, local bodies barred ‘outsider’ Muslims from attending Friday prayers in villages, enforced the removal of mosque loudspeakers, and ordered the closure of livestock markets ahead of Eid-al-Adha. In Assam, police arrested Muslims celebrating Eid under cattle-protection laws. (see section on Arrests and Detentions)
Alongside these measures, Hindu extremist groups intensified challenges to Muslim places of worship, advancing claims that mosques and mausoleums were built over temples and attempting to obstruct prayers. Incidents in Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Himachal Pradesh, among other states, saw mobs gather at mosques, disrupt worship, or demand demolition, often amid administrative silence and limited police intervention. These episodes marked the continuation of the long-documented pattern in which state authorities continued to fail to effectively protect Muslims’ right to worship freely and safely, allowing organised provocations to further shrink the space for public religious practice.
In 2025, the Assam government led by Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma enacted and advanced new legal measures that imposed heightened state control over Muslim personal practices and property transactions. These developments further consolidate Assam’s long-running pattern of selectively regulating Muslim social, family, and economic life through law.
- In November, the Assam Assembly passed the Assam Prohibition of Polygamy Bill, 2025, prescribing prison sentences of up to ten years for contracting a second marriage without formally dissolving the first, alongside penalties for clerics who solemnise such marriages. While the Chief Minister framed the law as a measure for women’s protection and invoked examples from Muslim-majority countries, the legislation was explicitly situated within broader political commitments to introduce a Uniform Civil Code in Assam. The law does not apply to Sixth Schedule areas or Scheduled Tribes, confirming that its practical impact will fall disproportionately on Muslim communities and their personal law practices.
- In August, the Assam Cabinet approved a new regime requiring prior government scrutiny of all land transfers between persons of different religions. Under the policy, applications must pass through district authorities, the Revenue Department, and the Special Branch of the Assam Police, which is tasked with examining the transaction for ‘fraud’, ‘coercion’, funding sources, and potential impacts on ‘social cohesion’ and ‘national security’, before a final decision is taken by the District Commissioner. The measure follows earlier temporary bans and public statements by the Chief Minister advocating permanent controls on Hindu–Muslim land transactions, and formalises what had already operated as an informal restriction in parts of the state.
In January 2025, Uttarakhand became the first Indian state to implement a Uniform Civil Code (UCC), replacing religion-specific personal laws with a common legal framework governing marriage, divorce, inheritance, and adoption. The move was widely hailed by the BJP as a landmark reform, but minority groups and legal experts warned that the law risked diluting constitutionally protected religious freedoms and minority personal law protections.
Within weeks, the Gujarat government announced the formation of a five-member committee to draft a state-level UCC, making it the second BJP-ruled state to formally advance the project. The panel—headed by a retired Supreme Court judge who had also chaired the Uttarakhand committee—was tasked with submitting its report within 45 days.
The Gujarat initiative closely followed national-level political endorsement of the UCC. In February, Prime Minister Narendra Modi defended the concept in Parliament, asserting that it reflected the intent of the Constitution’s framers and would ‘strengthen democracy’. While proponents portray the UCC as a gender-just and integrative reform, critics caution that the process risks disproportionately reshaping Muslim personal law and other minority traditions by drawing heavily on Hindu legal norms.
In 2025, the BJP-led Uttarakhand government significantly intensified its campaign against Islamic religious education, sealing over 200 madrassas across multiple districts and moving to dismantle the state’s existing madrassa governance framework altogether.
Between January and July, authorities sealed over Islamic institutions, including full-time madrassas and small maktabs offering part-time Quranic instruction, often without prior notice. Officials justified the action by labelling the institutions ‘unregistered’ or ‘illegal’, though community representatives reported that even registered madrassas were shut. Closures disproportionately affected poor Muslim children who rely on madrassas for basic literacy, meals, and religious instruction, with no clear rehabilitation or absorption plan disclosed.
Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami publicly framed the crackdown as a response to alleged ‘madrassa jihad’ or ‘taalim (learning) jihad’, repeatedly linking Islamic seminaries to criminality and illegal funding.
In the final quarter of the year, the state enacted the Uttarakhand Minority Educational Institutions Bill, 2025, repealing the Uttarakhand Madrassa Education Board Act, 2016, effective July 2026. The new law abolishes the Madrassa Board and subjects all minority-run institutions to a single state authority and the mainstream education framework. Legal challenges to both the mass closures and the new law are pending.
Throughout 2025, Indian authorities intensified restrictions on civic space, marked by the expanding use of criminal law, regulatory powers, surveillance mechanisms, and other forms of coercion against journalists, academics, civil society actors, artists, and other government critics. Some key developments included:
- Continuing targeting of journalists: According to a report by Free Speech Collective, at least eight Indian journalists were killed in 2025, including reporters in Uttar Pradesh (2), Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Odisha, Uttarakhand, Haryana, and the Andaman & Nicobar Islands. For instance, in January, journalist Mukesh Chandrakar was found murdered in Chhattisgarh after reporting on corruption and tribal rights in Bastar. In March, Raghvendra Bajpai was shot dead in Sitapur, Uttar Pradesh, with his family linking the killing to his reporting on local government schemes.
Several journalists remained incarcerated under draconian laws. In Gujarat, senior journalist Mahesh Langa, arrested in October 2024, continued to face multiple FIRs and was charged under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in April 2025, enabling prolonged detention. In Assam, journalist Dilwar Hussain Mozumder was arrested twice in March, and after securing bail, his elder brother was arrested in a separate case, with Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma publicly remarking that ‘ending people like him… is my work’. Several prominent Kashmiri journalists and human rights defenders—including Khurram Parvez—continued to remain incarcerated, while those that secured release after prolonged incarceration—such as Fahad Shah—remained constrained by stringent bail conditions, stigma, and financial precarity.
- Escalating crackdown on independent media and digital platforms: During the India–Pakistan military conflict in May 2025, authorities issued sweeping takedown and blocking orders targeting online context. On 9 May, the website of The Wire, an independent news outlet, was blocked nationwide following executive orders from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology. In the same period, the X accounts of Maktoob Media, Free Press Kashmir, The Kashmiriyat, and others were withheld. X later confirmed receiving orders to block over 8,000 accounts, including journalists, independent outlets, and international commentators, citing threats of criminal liability for non-compliance. In July, X disclosed additional orders to block 2,355 accounts, including those of international news agencies such as Reuters, without detailed justification. Records later showed that between March 2024 and December 2025, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued 91 takedown notices flagging over 1,100 URLs, more than half for allegedly ‘disturbing public order’, often during elections or security operations.
- Further consolidation of information blackhole in Kashmir: In August, authorities in Jammu & Kashmir banned 25 books by scholars and journalists, raided bookstores in Srinagar, and seized copies. In November, the State Investigation Agency raided the offices of newspaper Kashmir Times in Jammu, registered FIRs under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, and accused its editors, including Anuradha Bhasin, of promoting ‘secessionist ideology’. Police also seized journalists’ devices, Separately, in November, authorities demolished the family home of Jammu-based journalist Arfaz Ahmad Daing days after he publicly alleged police links to a drug-smuggling network, rendering his family homeless.
- Continuing restrictions on civil society, protest, and association: Authorities increasingly relied on funding restrictions, travel bans, and preventive detention to curb activism. In April, environmental activist Medha Patkar was arrested in a 24-year-old defamation case despite having been granted probation. In May, the Union government amended foreign-funding rules to bar NGOs receiving foreign funds from publishing newsletters or digital content without certification. In September, Ladakhi environmentalist Sonam Wangchuk was arrested under the National Security Act following mass protests demanding constitutional safeguards for Ladakh. Days earlier, the Home Ministry cancelled the foreign-funding licence of SECMOL, the non-profit he founded, and opened inquiries into other associated institutions. Earlier, in July, Home Minister Amit Shah directed a probe into the ‘financial aspects’ of protests held across India since 1974, calling for coordination with enforcement and tax authorities to prevent ‘mass agitations’.
- Continuing targeting of academics, artists, and cultural expression: In October, renowned Hindi scholar Francesca Orsini was stopped at Delhi airport and deported without explanation despite holding a valid long-term visa.
- Increasing normalisation of surveillance and executive overreach: In October, the government proposed amendments to the IT Rules mandating permanent metadata tagging of ‘synthetically generated’ content, prompting warnings that the measures could enable deep surveillance and chill anonymous speech. In November, the central government notified the Digital Personal Data Protection Rules, 2025, drawing criticism from digital rights groups for delaying user protections while expanding government access to personal data without meaningful oversight.
As referred to throughout the preceding sections, in 2025, India’s Muslims were systematically denied effective remedies for serious and widespread violations of their rights, whether arising from abuses committed during the year or from earlier violations that remained unaddressed. Across contexts, Muslim victims and survivors encountered entrenched, identity-based barriers at every stage of the remedial process. Police and prosecutorial action routinely worked against Muslim complainants, while judicial processes remained skewed in favour of state authorities and powerful Hindu nationalist actors. Even where courts attempted limited intervention, these efforts were episodic and insufficient to counter a broader climate of permissiveness and impunity that enabled perpetrators to evade accountability and normalised the denial of justice.
Below, we briefly assess India’s compliance with core elements of the international right to an effective remedy:
- Access to justice through safe, timely, and non-discriminatory complaint mechanisms: In practice, the denial of effective remedy was visible at the point of entry to justice system itself, where access to police and complaint mechanisms was routinely unsafe, delayed, or discriminatory. For instance, in 2025:
- In a Newslaundry report, families of victims of ‘encounter’ shootings in Assam described prolonged struggles to even have complaints meaningfully registered, with FIRs either closed as ‘mistake of fact’ or followed by repeated exoneration reports despite medical evidence of assault. In several instances, victims who filed complaints were subsequently subjected to retaliatory criminal action, including attempts to invoke national-security legislation against them, further deterring access to complaint mechanisms.
- In cases of mob lynching, police routinely misclassified hate crimes or avoided registering cases against perpetrators altogether. An August 2025 Article 14 investigation found that in at least nine lynching cases—predominantly involving Muslim victims—police failed to invoke newly enacted anti-lynching provisions under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, instead recording deaths as ordinary murders, accidents, and even filing counter-FIRs against the victims themselves.
- Following the February 2020 anti-Muslim violence in North-East Delhi, survivors repeatedly reported refusal to register FIRs against politically connected perpetrators, while complaints against Muslims were promptly acted upon. A trial court order directing registration of an FIR against BJP leader Kapil Mishra for alleged incitement was stayed in April 2025 at the request of Delhi Police.
- In a Newslaundry report, families of victims of ‘encounter’ shootings in Assam described prolonged struggles to even have complaints meaningfully registered, with FIRs either closed as ‘mistake of fact’ or followed by repeated exoneration reports despite medical evidence of assault. In several instances, victims who filed complaints were subsequently subjected to retaliatory criminal action, including attempts to invoke national-security legislation against them, further deterring access to complaint mechanisms.
- Effective, impartial investigations capable of establishing the facts and identifying perpetrators: Even when complaints were registered, investigations into violations affecting Muslims routinely failed to establish basic facts, identify responsible actors, or pursue credible lines of investigation. Investigative processes were frequently truncated, biased, or internally compromised, particularly where allegations implicated state officials, politically connected individuals, or Hindu extremist groups. For instance, in 2025:
- The Caravan investigation into the December 2023 custodial killings of Muslim civilians by Army personnel in the Poonch-Rajouri region revealed that, despite findings by an internal Army court of inquiry confirming torture, police investigations did not examine senior officers named in inquiry records, did not record statements from key military witnesses, and did not pursue criminal liability.
- In Assam, the Newslaundry investigation into ‘encounter’ killings revealed that police investigators routinely ignored post-mortem findings documenting blunt-force injuries, accepted implausible police narratives without verification, and filed closure reports despite named allegations against senior officials. Investigations were conducted by officers hierarchically subordinate to those accused, and critical forensic and digital evidence was not independently examined.
A Print analysis of cases arising from the February 2020 anti-Muslim violence in North-East Delhi showed that local courts repeatedly recorded that police investigations relied on contradictory witness statements, delayed or manipulated identification procedures, and selective use of digital evidence, while failing to examine the role of politically connected Hindu extremist perpetrators, despite contemporaneous video and public material.
- Prosecutions and judicial processes that are fair, independent, and free from discrimination or undue delay: Where cases progressed beyond the investigative stage, prosecutorial decision-making and judicial processes frequently operated in a matter that was discriminatory or marked by uneven delay, particularly in cases involving Muslim victims or accused. For instance, in 2025:
- In Uttar Pradesh, the state government moved to withdraw prosecution in the 2015 lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq—more than a decade after the crime—seeking to drop all charges against the accused, including murder, despite the gravity of the offence and the vulnerability of the victims’ family. Although a Surajpur court ultimately rejected the withdrawal plea and ordered a fast-tracked trial with day-to-day hearings in December 2025, the episode was yet another instance of the UP government attempting to shield Hindu nationalist perpetrators of anti-Muslim violence.
- In cases arising from the February 2020 anti-Muslim violence in Delhi, analyses of court proceedings showed that prosecutions against Hindu perpetrators have remained exceptionally limited and ineffective. Five years on, only 20 convictions have been secured across hundreds of cases arising from 757 FIRs, with 82% of decided cases ending in acquittal. Courts repeatedly cited prosecutorial failures, lack of admissible evidence, and contradictory police testimony.
- At the same time, prosecutions against Muslim protest leaders under conspiracy charges have proceeded under India’s principal anti-terrorism law, the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), with trials yet to commence and bail routinely denied. In January 2026, the Supreme Court rejectedthe bail pleas of Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam, invoking Section 43D(5) of the UAPA, a provision that effectively reverses ordinary bail standards by prohibiting release where courts find the prosecution’s allegations to be prima facie true. The Court held that prolonged pre-trial incarceration alone did not render continued detention ‘constitutionally impermissible.’ While granting bail to five co-accused on the basis of their allegedly peripheral roles, the Court characterised Khalid and Imam as occupying a ‘qualitatively different footing’ as alleged masterminds, and allowed them to renew bail only after the examination of protected witnesses or after one year, whichever occurred earlier. Both Khalid and Imam have remained in prolonged pre-trial detention since September 2020 and January 2020 respectively, over five years in custody without their trials having commenced.
- In Maharashtra, serious prosecutorial failures resulted in statutory bail for the Hindu men accused in the August 2025 killing of Suleman Khan Pathan in Jamner after police failed to file a chargesheet within the prescribed period, despite the availability of eyewitness accounts. Bail was granted not on merits but due to procedural default, illustrating how prosecutorial delay directly undermined accountability in cases involving Muslim victims.
- Conversely, in terrorism-related prosecutions targeting Muslims, courts routinely prolonged trials despite grave evidentiary concerns. In July 2025, the Bombay High Court acquitted 12 Muslim men in the 2006 Mumbai train blasts case after they had spent over 19 years in prison, finding that confessions had been extracted under torture and that the prosecution case was fundamentally flawed. Despite these findings, no accountability was fixed for prosecutorial or police misconduct, and no compensation was ordered.
- Adequate reparation for victims: Victims and survivors of serious abuses against Muslims rarely received timely, adequate, or comprehensive reparations. Reparative measures, where provided, were typically ad hoc, symbolic, or limited to ex gratia payments, without accompanying truth, accountability, or guarantees of non-repetition. For instance, in 2025:
- Five years after the February 2020 anti-Muslim violence in North-East Delhi, a Karwan-e-Mohabbat report found that beyond nominal death relief, no meaningful compensation was disbursed for injuries or widespread property destruction, despite Muslims accounting for over 95% of damage claims and 81% of reported losses relating to property; the state-appointed (then led by the opposition Aam Aadmi Party) Claims Commission processed assessments but failed to release funds, issue receipts, or meaningfully engage survivors.
In Jammu & Kashmir, families of Muslim civilians killed by security forces— including in cases confirmed by official inquiries—reported being excluded from government compensation schemes that provided jobs and financial assistance to families of civilians killed by militants.
- In Assam, families of victims of custodial violence and alleged ‘encounter’ killings reported being offered limited monetary compensation while investigations stalled or were closed.
- Five years after the February 2020 anti-Muslim violence in North-East Delhi, a Karwan-e-Mohabbat report found that beyond nominal death relief, no meaningful compensation was disbursed for injuries or widespread property destruction, despite Muslims accounting for over 95% of damage claims and 81% of reported losses relating to property; the state-appointed (then led by the opposition Aam Aadmi Party) Claims Commission processed assessments but failed to release funds, issue receipts, or meaningfully engage survivors.
- Independent and effective oversight of the State’s compliance with remedial obligations: In 2025, India’s domestic mechanisms continued to fail to operate as independent or effective checks on executive, police, and prosecutorial excesses, particularly in cases involving serious violations against Muslims. For instance:
- In February 2025, the UN Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers issued a formal allegation letter to India warning that existing rules, procedures and practices in the Indian judiciary risk undermining judicial independence and impartiality, particularly at the level of the Supreme Court. The letter further warned that post-retirement appointments of judges to government positions risk creating a ‘perception of rewards’ capable of influencing judicial conduct, and flagged the wide discretionary power of the Chief Justice of India over listing and allocation of cases. Such discretion, particularly in politically sensitive matters, was cautioned to affect the ‘real or perceived impartiality and independence of the Supreme Court’, directly weakening judicial oversight as an effective remedial safeguard.
An International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) report published the same month flagged many of the same concerns.
In December 2024, SAJC had co-published a detailed report ‘Perception of Judicial Independence and Impartiality at the Indian Supreme Court’, with Guernica 37 Group.
In March 2025, the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANHRI) Sub-Committee on Accreditation recommended downgrading India’s National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) from ‘A’ to ‘B’ status, citing persistent non-compliance with the Paris Principles. The SCA highlighted the NHRC’s lack of independence from the executive, continued reliance on serving police officers to investigate allegations against the police, opaque appointment processes, inadequate pluralism, and failure to meaningfully address systemic violations, including custodial abuse and excessive use of force. The downgrade followed repeated deferrals since 2016 and illustrates the NHRC’s inability to function as an effective oversight body capable of ensuring accountability or remedy.
- The 2025 India Justice Report, published in April, further highlighted systemic weaknesses across policing, courts, prisons, and legal aid, including severe judicial vacancies, overwhelming caseloads, under-resourced forensic and oversight mechanisms, and poor transparency. These structural deficits were found to disproportionately affect Muslims and other marginalised groups, limiting both the detection of remedial failures and the ability of oversight bodies to intervene in a timely and effective manner.
- In February 2025, the UN Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers issued a formal allegation letter to India warning that existing rules, procedures and practices in the Indian judiciary risk undermining judicial independence and impartiality, particularly at the level of the Supreme Court. The letter further warned that post-retirement appointments of judges to government positions risk creating a ‘perception of rewards’ capable of influencing judicial conduct, and flagged the wide discretionary power of the Chief Justice of India over listing and allocation of cases. Such discretion, particularly in politically sensitive matters, was cautioned to affect the ‘real or perceived impartiality and independence of the Supreme Court’, directly weakening judicial oversight as an effective remedial safeguard.
The developments and patterns documented above indicate that domestic remedies available to Muslim victims in India during the year were largely illusory, inconsistent, and incapable of meeting international standards of accessibility, impartiality, timeliness, or effectiveness.