Talk:Freedom of religion in India

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Biased and does not present the whole picture on relious freedom in India. July 25, 2005

Gandhi Statement
According to his article, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi once said: "Yes I am. I am also a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist and a Jew," when asked whether he was a Hindu. It appears rather unlikely that:


 * "Gandhi opposed the Christian missionaries calling them as the remnants of colonial Western culture[2]. He claimed that by converting into Christianity, Hindus have changed their nationality.[3]"

If this wasn't properly referred, this would have already been deleted. I think that we need a full (sourced) citation of what he said. Zara1709 (talk) 20:09, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

The dear writer Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was indeed a secular person his resentment was towards the European powers that MURDER LOOTED RAPED CARRIED HERITAGES AWAY, ENCOURAGED BY INDULGING IN SLAVERY AND SUPPRESSIONS AND OTHER SUCH SHAMEFUL ACTS FOR HALFWAY AROUND THE WORLD SPAINARDS AND PORTUGUESE DRAWING A LINE ON THE WORLD MAP DIVIDING AMONG THEMSELVES LIKE THE WORLD WAS A PARTRARCHIAL PROPERTY. Encouraging others to do so. For you and I both know it to be true that the 7 wonders are around the world because they cannot be carried with them home to Europe so don't confuse the hatred for the colonialists with innocent Christians across the world and 2nd most populated country in the world and politicise against the most powerful man of 20th century. For be coloniolized and then let's talk. Take care and have a happy time ahead God bless you with good health and happiness. And maybe even wealth. CAPTAIN NOBODY (talk) 11:02, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

IP user's vandalism
A good amount of referenced material has been removed/replaced by IP user 47.102.212.108 in November 2008. Can someone work on reverting those changes? Else this article does not stand as B-class one now.--GDibyendu (talk) 13:20, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

This page is an unfunny joke...
It has been edited with such a severe bias that after reading it one gets the impression that it is the 80% Hindu majority of India that is regularly persecuted by the 20% minorities with half a dozen different religions, even though the reality of the situation is a stark contrast. Please fix it, or just add it to the catagory of "contemporary dark humor" and be done with it. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.152.72.165 (talk) 07:48, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Needs attention and cleanup
This article has been subjected to multiple unmonitored POV additions and not one of them has any regard for the entire page as a whole; because of that, it now reads like a collection of conflicting biased statements and lacks any flow or proper organised structure. A page of this importance really needs additional watchers and interested contributors. I'll try to do some basic clean up and fill in any missing gaps. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 17:16, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Needed Edits
I believe the article is uninformative and at worst completely misguided. It currently suffers from the following,

[1] The article switches tense sometimes between paragraphs in the same section.

[2] Talks about unnecessary details, for instance "... Freedom of religion is established in tradition as Hinduism does not recognise labels of distinct religions ..." This is an encyclopedia not a sermon. Even if we included this statement,This is politely put- nonsense. There isn't a central authority to Hinduism unlike other faiths; there is no way to verify this statement.

[3] Says pretentious things "India is the birthplace of four major world religions: Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism ... "  What is major? Number of followers ? Jainism and Sikhism aren't major religions of the world, in that context.

[4] The history section is misplaced and frankly wrong. Buddhism was the state religion of Ashoka's reign, Islam of the Sultanate and Mughals.

Note the article is about Freedom of religion in India, not the subcontinent.

[5] The laws against conversion section is too big. Wikipedia isn't a compendium of laws. Mere mention that special protections exist is enough with a few examples being cited as news articles.

[6] The section Cases of religious violence is completely misguided and presumptuous. Wikipedia is not a news reporter. I fail to see the connection between hate crimes and the ability to practice my own faith. Why is this part of this particular article?

I have made these edits already but they've been reverted twice -ostensibly under the pretext of protecting information. I'd like to listen to arguments why the article must be retained in its current form.

Nanasid (talk) 21:34, 24 June 2014 (UTC)


 * It doesn't have to remain in it's current form but your proposed version is significantly worse. Only the first sentence (already existing) and last paragraph (using already existing sources) are properly sourced. The middle contains unsourced synthesis. As to your specific points:
 * 1 - So fix the grammar.
 * 2 - It's sourced.
 * 3 - You're quibbling over a word. The text can be replaced by text in India (a featured article): "Four world religions—Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism—originated here, whereas Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived in the 1st millennium CE and also helped shape the region's diverse culture"
 * 4 - The entire section is wrong because of one disputed fact?
 * 5 - Notable rulings affecting the topic should be discussed in prose.
 * 6 - This section should discuss how hate crimes (or anything else) directly prevent freedom of religion.
 * Ugog Nizdast, any time to devote to this? Maybe get Wikiproject India involved? --Neil N  talk to me 23:34, 24 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Don't have much time these days but I've make sure to work on it if no one else has, by the time I'm free for this since I've tagged it. After looking at the state of it, I remember posting on the WP:INB for it to be watchlisted by anyone.
 * Such mass blanking is really not warranted. Yes, of course there are significant problems on current version of the page. What's needed to do is weed out the unsourced POV statements which have been added in-between paras over these years, rewrite, trim down and summarise content which have their own main page. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 10:15, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

I've fixed the grammar. I haven't copied random pieces of text. The sentence on civil law is accurate. I can easily provide many sources from news articles or even public parliamentary proceedings in India. I find working on the wikipedia website a chore, so I could not attach more references before accidentally submitting and reloading and so on, I'm sorry about that.

The broad structure of the article must be the current state of laws and notable cases to restricting the freedom to practice any religion (of which there are none). The proper place for other information is another article on the evolution of religion(s) in the subcontinent.Please look at the Britannica entry, if you so wish.

I must repeat, I believe encyclopedias must be precise not verbose collections of fact (like the CIA Factbook), much less opinions being peddled as fact. I have deliberately removed content that is unnecessary. The History section, I do not believe should be a part of this article.It's too broad to be dealt with one section.

Nanasid (talk) 14:44, 25 June 2014 (UTC)
 * "The broad structure of the article must be the current state of laws and notable cases to restricting the freedom to practice any religion" -> Disagree
 * "The History section, I do not believe should be a part of this article." -> Disagree
 * Other articles (Freedom of religion in the United States, Freedom of religion in France) discuss historical underpinnings. --Neil N  talk to me 14:52, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Mention of Shia Muslims example in the lead
governmental agents are altering real facts in this encyclopedia. (This was the old one, I altered the section title -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 14:48, 12 March 2015 (UTC))

i dont know why people are removing a section in heading context. I am trying to express breach of religious freedom in kashmir. But many wikipedians are irritated with this. Although i have provided links to it. Pleade help to stop them. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 49.138.59.49 (talk) 09:24, 12 March 2015 (UTC)


 * We've mentioned this and each instance pertaining to other communities in the article. By adding it also to the lead section with this edit, gives undue weight to it. The lead section gives an introduction and summary to the rest of the article. Currently it talks about how "in India it is a fundamental right..." (first para), "India is the birthplace of four major world religions..." and suddenly we single out this incident in Kashmir concerning the Shia community. It's just not relevant enough there. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 14:48, 12 March 2015 (UTC)

Violence versus Persecution
Actual incidents of violence shouldn't be mentioned here in such detail. Religious freedom violations include forced conversion, persecution and suppression of rights; full-fledged violence is more serious and belongs to Religious violence in India. I'm planning to trim the "Cases of religious violence" section. &#x2011;Ugog Nizdast (talk) 13:05, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't get it. Why have you deleted major portions of the article on the pretext that it would come in religious violence article? Does religious violence not matter in "Freedom of religion"? ~ ScitDei Wanna talk? 06:51, 16 September 2015 (UTC)
 * At that rate, wouldn't this page and the religious violence page literally mirror each other? This page would literally become an indiscriminate collection of information. I fine with a smaller mention about religious violence. Moreover, pages like Freedom_of_religion_in_France and Freedom_of_religion_in_the_United_States talk about laws and actual conflicts of religious freedom with the state. Let's see if I can find anything to fill that up. &#x2011;Ugog Nizdast (talk) 09:54, 16 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I agree. "Religious Freedom" should talk about the social norms and conditions at large. Individual incidents should be mentioned only if representative of the society at large. We shouldn't miss the forest for the woods. - Kautilya3 (talk) 17:29, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

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Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 17:39, 7 October 2017 (UTC) ==The Supreme Court supported the laws saying, "What is freedom for one is freedom for the other in equal measure and there can, therefore, be no such thing as a fundamental right to convert any person to one’s own religion".== Yet the constitution allows the promotion of religion. Maybe Indian English uses convert to mean force conversion. Global English allows conversion to be voluntary.

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INC Government
You said in the edit summary that ...You stated explicitly "Congress did not" - that's an opinion and your agenda, the facts are proved by my citations How are these incidents related to Freedom of religion in India?
 * 1) You did not provide reference for 1966 anti-cow slaughter agitation, 1967 Ranchi-Hatia riots, 1969 Gujarat Riots and 1970 Bhiwandi riots
 * 2) Your reference to 1974 Delhi Riots does not say anything about congress.
 * 3) You did not provide reference for 1980 Moradabad riots.
 * 4) The reference for 1981 Godhra Riots does not mention congress.
 * 5) The reference for 1981 Biharsharif riots nowhere mentions that congress is involved.
 * 6) The reference for 1981 Hyderabad Riots does not say that congress is involved.
 * 7) The reference for 1982 Baroda Riots is a report by the congress party which is unreliable.
 * 8) The reference for 1982 Meerut Riots does not say congress is involved.
 * 9) No reference were provided for 1983 Nellie Massacre, 1984 Bhiwandi riots, 1984 anti-Sikh riots and 1985 Gujarat riots and for the last sentence which says the incident occurred during the time of congress rule.

The second paragraph is a about the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and how is that related to Freedom of religion in India? The article does not explain in detail about any one incident of communal violence. Your content belongs to Religious violence in India without any WP:OR, not here. SUN EYE 1 14:16, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

I can debate all day long, but i'll get to the point. No matter what you say, the second para is an "incident" and "example" that demonstrates infringement on freedom of religion by INC government, just like Partition is an "incident". As for the first para, if your eyes are truly unbiased, then can you not see so many riots during a time of Central and State govt is of Congress, it is surely their ineptitude to blame just as "in 2019, religious violence increased because of BJP ineptitude" - paraphrased and taken from the current Wiki article. Under INC Government there were many time and many folds over more infringements of freedom of religion as demonstrated by the sheer number of riots that took place under their rule. My sources corroborated that as the fact that they happened under their rule means that they ARE involved. If you want a source which takes the name of INC too then here is one. https://www.sciencespo.fr/mass-violence-war-massacre-resistance/en/document/hindu-muslim-communal-riots-india-i-1947-1986.html

Trying to inform readers about Freedom of Religion in India without briefly talking about Religious violence is not possible. Even the BJP Government, partition sections talk about violence, that doesn't mean it belongs to the Religious violence in India wikipedia page. BharatiyaPandit (talk) 04:20, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
 * , You did not answer to the first paragraph. You need to provide reliable sources that explicitly say that freedom of religion in India decreased or increased due to the Congress or any other political party not WP:OR. This article does not mention any incidents of violence in detail. The addition of incidents in detail has been previously discussed at Talk:Freedom_of_religion_in_India. Also we don't need to explain in detail about the involvement of BJP and VHP in communal violence like the 2002 Gujarat riots per this report by Human Rights Watch, else the article will become into a WP:INDISCRIMINATE collection of off-topic information. SUN EYE 1  05:33, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

At this point it is obvious to those who are unbiased to see what's happening here. You do it quite blatantly, with no fear, not surprising considering which platform we are typing on. For example, you said "the reference for 1982 Baroda Riots is a report by the congress party which is unreliable." You choose that based on your bias, on your agenda. You are nobody to say that.

If there was a section on partition which is an incident, a section on 1984 incident is justifiable. If there is a huge huge number of riots that happened under Congress rule, then surely if you open your eyes that does count as infringement of freedom of religion and that is a proof of their ineptitude to guarantee freedom of religion in India. You just want Wikipedia to remain a one-way portal! BharatiyaPandit (talk) 10:42, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Are you here to accuse me of some bias or agenda or to discuss about content? You could get sanctioned for these baseless accusations per WP:NPA and WP:ASPERSIONS. If you think a report by a political party is reliable take it to WP:RSN.
 * If you think congress is involved in anything to do with Freedom of religion in India bring WP:RS which explicitly states it. Wikipedia does not work with WP:OR. This article does not mention any incidents in detail as already discussed in Talk:Freedom_of_religion_in_India. SUN EYE 1  11:03, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
 * If you think congress is involved in anything to do with Freedom of religion in India bring WP:RS which explicitly states it. Wikipedia does not work with WP:OR. This article does not mention any incidents in detail as already discussed in Talk:Freedom_of_religion_in_India. SUN EYE 1  11:03, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Pointless to talk to you. Go ahead sanction me if you want, you are the one who needs sanctioning though. Although its better the less words I use for you, the better. Its good this is on the talk page. If any rational people come in future, here was the minimal edit I made https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Freedom_of_religion_in_India&oldid=988993877 - may come in use for someone with more energy than me to fight the rigged system here.

Anyways, none of my incidents were in detail as you accuse. My 1984 para was ~ 4 lines just like the partition incident paragraph. Obviously 4 lines is not detailed, there is a whole wiki page and few more dedicated to doing that. My other para just demonstrated the quantity of freedom of religion infringements in a short period. Anyways, this i'm writing not for you Suneye, but for future viewers as they probably will have enough grey matter to process the simple point I tried to convey to you. Goodbye signing out permanently so do whatever sanction you want! Happy Diwali. BharatiyaPandit (talk) 18:34, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

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Figures for religions are wrong
They don't seem to match the 2011 census figures. I'm spending too much time fixing these on pages due to vandalism, can someone else please do this. Doug Weller talk 08:00, 8 October 2023 (UTC)


 * ✅ The figures were overall correct but there was a rounding off error, which I have now fixed. Lord Clayton7 (talk) 21:34, 8 October 2023 (UTC)