It took New Delhi two days to respond to the sharp rebuke administered in September by the US State Department to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its militant affiliates like the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the Bajrang Dal (BD), for rising violence against Muslims and Christians in India.
Obviously, the State Department was provoked into making the statement by the killing of an Australian missionary and his two sons in Orissa in January by a Hindu fundamentalist (and suspected Bajrang Dal activist) who is still at large nine months after committing the crime (although he surfaced in August to kill a Muslim trader in full public view), and the attacks on Christians in Gujarat, incidents that received worldwide coverage. Its report also dealt at length with the plight of Muslims, as "governments at the state and local levels only partially respect religious freedom", and "local police and government officials abet violence against minorities". Significantly, the State Department also noted that Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Home Minister L.K. Advani are members of the RSS, as are the chief ministers of BJP-ruled states.
When the caretaker government finally did respond, it dubbed the reprimand as an "intrusive exercise", and suggested that instead of India, "where the constitution guarantees religious freedom" and so on and so forth, the US should "focus its efforts on countries which remain under the pall of bigotry and intolerance, where religious minorities are discriminated against by law…"
This evasive response revealed that the Vajpayee-led government — notwithstanding illusions of superpower status and eagerness to strut the global stage after last year's nuclear tests — is simply unable to stand up to rich and powerful nations even when they whip India publicly. The Indian government did not dare tell the US to refrain from sanctimonious preaching and policing. It was left to principled votaries of secularism and equality to point out that while it is true that India has to bear the cross of the Sangh Parivar, the US too is haunted by the spectre of right-wing militias with anti-minority agendas.