India took on United Nations Human Rights chief, Michele Bachelet who had stated that civilians face violence in the country, in Geneva on Tuesday.
Bachelet, while giving the “Global Human Rights Update”, said, “incidents of military and police violence against civilians continue, including use of pellet guns, as well as incidents related to the military.”
Mr Indra Mani Pandey, while responding to the statement expressed his disappointment at Bachelet’s statement and said that since changes were made in the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir (referring to the abrogation of the Article 35 A and 370), people there are enjoying the same fundamental rights of freedom as citizens elsewhere in India.
“We have been able to revive grassroots democracy and provide new momentum to social and economic development, despite the challenge posed by COVID-19 pandemic and persistent attempts by one country to infiltrate terrorists to derail this process by all possible means,” Pandey said.
Though he didn’t name the country it was obvious that he was referring to Pakistan.
Further to that, he also added how the work which is done towards the development of the state has “yielded unprecedented growth”
Indian representative points out that India is the largest and most diverse democracy and has always rooted for human rights since its independence.
“We urge the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to recognize the enormity of challenges that we face due to our large and very diverse population of 1.3 billion and act as our partner in a cooperative and constructive spirit in our endeavour to secure for our people all their basic human rights,” Mr. Pandey said in reply.
The envoy mentioned that India will always extend its support to the Council and OHCHR for the protection and promotion of human rights.
