New Delhi: Amnesty International India a United Kingdom based Human rights group on Thursday launched a new interactive data website called ‘Halt The Hate’. The new website documents around 498 incidents of alleged hate crimes against Dalits, Adivasis, members of racial or religious minority groups, transgender persons, and other marginalized people which have been reported in mainstream English and Hindi media.
In the absence of official statistics on hate crimes, this website is an important resource for civil society and journalists. Through this website, we aim to highlight hate crimes in India and bring it in public discourse.
In 2017, an alarming number of alleged hate crimes – including assault, rape and murder – were reported against people from marginalized groups, especially Dalits and Muslims, said Amnesty International India today, as it launched an interactive data website, ‘Halt the Hate’.
“The first step to ensuring justice and ending impunity for hate crimes – where people are targeted because of their membership of a particular group – is to highlight their occurrence,” said Aakar Patel, Executive Director, Amnesty International India.
“Our website aims to draw attention to some of these crimes by tracking and documenting them. Many of these incidents are deeply disturbing: Dalits have been attacked for merely sporting moustaches, and Muslims lynched for transporting cattle. Dalit women have been branded as witches, and raped and killed.
“Unfortunately, the extent of hate crime in India is unknown because the law – with some exceptions – does not recognize hate crimes as specific offences. The police need to take steps to unmask any potentially discriminatory motive in a crime, and political leaders must be more vocal in denouncing such violence.”
The website documents alleged hate crimes from September 2015, when Mohammad Akhlaq was killed in Dadri, Uttar Pradesh, for allegedly killing a cow. Cow-related violence and so-called ‘honour’ killings were among the common instances of alleged hate crimes. Uttar Pradesh was the state with the most such incidents in 2016 and 2017. In 2016, 237 alleged hate crimes were recorded. Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Gujarat recorded the most incidents.
In order to access the website you may click on the following link: http://haltthehate.amnesty.org.in/