India: Majority of Indians support military rule and autocracy

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India | 04 November 2017

On 17 October 2017 the Hindustan Times and other media published the outcome of a Pew survey, which stated that more than four-fifths of Indian citizens trust their government. Interestingly, the survey also revealed that a majority of Indians also support military rule and autocracy. "In India, where the economy has grown on average by 6.9% since 2012, 85% (of people) trust their national government," Pew Research said in a report based on its survey on governance and trust among key countries across the world. Rolf Zeegers, persecution analyst at World Watch Research, regards the developments in India as very worrying: "The fact that economic growth seems to be more important for the Indian population than principles like democracy, religious freedom and human rights is nothing new. This can be seen in many other countries as well. What is particularly worrying here is that a majority also support a move away from democracy (dropping India"s claim of being the world"s largest democratic country) to an authoritarian type of government." Rolf Zeegers continues: "For Christians (some of whom voted for the current government) the outcome of the Pew survey is a warning. Ever since the BJP came to power under Prime Minister Modi in May 2014 Hindu extremist intolerance of all non-Hindus has increased greatly. The level of impunity for the culprits of violent attacks against religious minorities has also increased. And now more than four-fifths of the Indian population gives the government a "˜Like", and even wants to enhance their powers! The outcome of the survey is very positive for the present government and will certainly encourage the country"s rulers to continue or even increase their negative policies towards India"s religious minorities."