India’s Human Rights Record Challenged at UNHRC

India’s Human Rights Record Challenged at UNHRC

During the 60th session of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva during the months of September and October 2025, India was placed under strong international scrutiny. Instead of becoming a platform for collaboration and advancement of human rights, it became a lynching of one of the biggest democracies in the world. Several foreign NGOs raised alarms about a crisis of accountability that New Delhi is experiencing and the disturbing trend of negligence, discrimination, and repression that undermines the very notion of the nation as a secular democracy.

The session of UNHRC and Tamil Nadu incident in India

If one talks about the sharpest criticism raised at the session, it was on the Society of Development and Community Empowerment (SDCE), which highlighted the Tamil Nadu rally tragedy on September 27, 2025, at the global level. The group outlined the role of the state negligence and anarchic mismanagement in a political event in Tiruchirappalli that caused the deaths of 41, and injury of over hundred people. Witnesses have photographed a panic, where there was a lack of control of the crowd, missing medical preparedness, and complete malfunction of emergency mechanisms.

Similarly, the statement of SDCE showed that the incident was not only a tragic accident, but also a manifestation of the long-term neglect of Indian attitude towards safety of the population. They believed that it is a case of government mismanagement.

Reaction of Tamil Nadu towards government’s handling of the incident

Furthermore, the group condemned the way the government handled the aftermath. It raised the issue that no transparent investigations were conducted. Bureaucracies and political interference have been reported to have been experienced by families of the victims in search of justice. The SDCE called on the UNHRC to compel India to adopt enforceable national standards of safety during public events.

Although, the Tamil Nadu tragedy highlighted laxity at the household level, a similar intervention by the International Action Peace and Sustainable Development (IAPSD) highlighted the actions of India in Jammu and Kashmir. The NGO alleged that Indian officials had been systematically trying to suppress religious and political freedom in the Muslim dominated region.
The IAPSD statement revealed that peaceful faith-based gatherings faced police violence, arbitrary arrests, and surveillance, with FIRs against local clerics on flimsy religious grounds.

The NGO condemned this growing suppression, warning that criminalizing prayer equates to criminalizing identity.

Criticism from Human Rights observers

Besides, this criticism was particularly close to those human rights observers’ claims, who have long stated that India has been undermining civil liberties in the region of Kashmir. The de facto autonomy of the region was repealed in 2019. Blackouts and censorship of journalists on the internet, and anti-terror laws against civilians have been a constant subject of concern among UN rapporteurs. The intervention proposed by the IAPSD implied that 2025 was not a better situation, but a further step towards authoritarianism. So, in this era, voicing faith can be viewed as dissent.

Moving forward, both NGOs and reports which put forward their arguments about the negligence over safety in Tamil Nadu, and the persecution of Muslims in Kashmir, show that the government is far more interested in political optics than in the lives and freedoms of its people.

Meanwhile, India continued with its typical defensive position at the UNHRC. Its delegation rejected accusations by calling them political in nature. However, this argument, which once seemed convincing to some member states, was weakened significantly.

Various delegations quietly vented frustrations on why India still declines to permit independent human rights surveillance,particularly in conflict-prone areas. This made the NGOs put India at a very global center with global representatives.

They presented that India was not the ideal example of democracy, but a case study of democratic backsliding.

This story was relayed by international media houses, increasing demands of accountability and UN mechanisms to monitor the situation within India closely.

Position of India at international level

Indeed, the timing of this session was very important. India is now pursuing a more prominent place at world human rights and peace agencies, as a responsible power that believes in the rule of law. However, the testimonies at the UNHRC strongly criticized the story of a country that oppresses its own citizens and does not care about their well-being. So, it cannot be called a credible arbiter on human rights matters.

Nevertheless, several observed that domestic political environment in India has become intolerant of criticism. The civil society groups are subjected to rigorous examination, and the international NGOs have been subject to repressive funding legislations, and journalists reporting on sensitive matters face intimidation or harassment by the law. Additionally, in the ongoing context, the case of Tamil Nadu and IOJK are not isolated instances, but a testament of a structural issue.

On top of that, Geneva by the end of the session was saying that India is not a collection of isolated failures, but a story of neglect and non-cooperation. The SDCE and IAPSD interventions served as a reminder to the Council, and indeed to the world, that the elections or rhetoric of democracy are of secondary importance.

Finally, when the UNHRC concluded its 60th session, India was again under pressure by the international community to open its borders to an independent investigator. It also had to adopt recommendations of the earlier UN reviews. It has the option to accept or reject them. But rejecting these demands will set a negative image of India in front of the world. The global community will perceive it as a failing country regarding assurance of human rights, rather than being the largest democracy.