The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has urged Washington to avoid high-level engagement and diplomatic courtesies for leaders of India’s Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) ahead of a planned U.S. visit by its chief, Mohan Bhagwat.
The commission also renewed its call for targeted sanctions against RSS members and others it says are responsible for attacks on religious minorities, including Christians and Muslims.
USCIRF Chair Asif Mahmood said Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a member of the RSS, describing the organisation as an umbrella group whose affiliates have been accused of violence against religious minorities.
“Now the RSS leader, Mohan Bhagwat, plans to visit the U.S.,” Mahmood said in a statement.
USCIRF Commissioner Gene Mills said U.S. authorities should withhold high-level engagement from RSS leaders and consider sanctions against individuals responsible for what the commission describes as religious freedom violations.
In its 2026 annual report, USCIRF recommended that the United States designate India as a “Country of Particular Concern” and impose targeted sanctions on individuals and organisations, including the RSS, over alleged responsibility for or tolerance of serious religious freedom violations.
The commission also called for the freezing of assets belonging to sanctioned individuals or entities and for their exclusion from the United States. It recommended linking future U.S. security assistance and bilateral trade policy with India to improvements in religious freedom, and halting arms sales under the Arms Export Control Act.
USCIRF said conditions for religious freedom in India deteriorated further in 2025, citing discriminatory legislation, attacks by Hindu nationalist mobs against Muslims and Christians, and measures affecting minority religious institutions.
Among the measures cited were the 2025 Waqf law and Uttarakhand’s USAME Act, which the commission said affected minority institutions.
The commission also highlighted the use of anti-conversion laws, saying several Indian states had broadened their scope and increased penalties. It said 12 of India’s 28 states have such laws and that several states introduced or strengthened them in 2025.
USCIRF is a bipartisan U.S. federal government body established under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. It monitors religious freedom worldwide and makes policy recommendations to the U.S. president, secretary of state and Congress.
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