Why is Amnesty urging India to halt bulldozing of Muslim properties?
Al Jazeera
Rights group calls for a halt to the demolition of Muslim properties, calling it a form of extra-judicial punishment.
Amnesty International has called on Indian authorities to immediately halt the “unlawful” demolitions of Muslim properties, as it released two new reports describing the targeting of homes, businesses and places of worship across several states belonging to the minority community.
Calling the demolitions a form of extra-judicial punishment, the rights group demanded adequate compensation to all those affected by the demolitions that have rendered hundreds of people, most of them Muslims, homeless and their livelihoods destroyed.
The London-based rights group also called on the JCB construction-equipment company, whose bulldozers have been widely used in the “punitive” demolitions, to “publicly condemn the use of its machinery to commit human rights violations”.
Here are the main points of the reports.
The two reports, titled ‘Bulldozer Injustice in India’ and ‘JCB’s Role and Responsibility in Bulldozer Injustice in India’, document demolitions of at least 128 properties between April and June 2022. Amnesty International says the demolitions carried out by bulldozers have rendered at least 617 people either homeless or destroyed their livelihoods.
