Video Courtesy: IAMC TV
Setalvad's brief testimony was before a full session of the UN Human Rights Council on March 15, 2017, with all the UN member countries in attendance, convened to review the report of the UN Rapporteur on Minority Rights. She noted that since the UN Special Rapporteur's 2013 General Assembly report, the following developments had taken place in India:
1.Speeches by political leaders and members of Parliament had exacerbated the violence in Muzaffarnagar that claimed over 60 lives and left thousands homeless;
2. The targeting of religious minorities accused of "improper" conversions from Hinduism;
3. In the wake of state laws banning the sale of beef, mob attacks on people alleged to have beef in their possession have becoming a recurring event;
4. The Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial or arbitrary executions noted that encounter killings "have become virtually a part of unofficial State policy" in India;
5. The above acts are often committed with impunity stemming in part from close alignment between the government and non-state actors;
6. Law enforcement agencies fabricate terrorism cases where Muslims are often targets.
Her testimony was part of a larger effort by several partner organizations that includes a joint submission to the UN Human Rights Council for India's Universal Periodic Review (UPR) scheduled for May 4,2017.
To view the testimony on the UN's webtv may be viewed here.