A US court has ordered Prime Minister Narendra Modi to answer allegations that he failed to stop anti-Muslim rioting when he was chief minister of Gujarat, overshadowing his first trip to the United States as his country's leader.
The civil case before a New York court seeks compensatory and punitive damages from Modi for crimes against humanity and extrajudicial killings under the Alien Tort Claims Act and the Torture Victim Protection Act. Modi has 21 days to respond.
The petitioner in the case is the American Justice Center, a non-profit human rights organisation, acting on behalf of two survivors of the 2002 riots in Gujarat.
“There is evidence to support the conclusion that Modi committed both acts of intentional and malicious direction to authorities in India to kill and maim innocent persons of the Muslim faith,” the petition said.
After years of being unwelcome in the United States, Modi will arrive for a five-day visit on Friday (September 26) where he will speak at the United Nations in New York before heading to Washington for talks with President Barack Obama.
The first meeting between the two leaders follows Modi's landslide general election victory in May. Compared with other foreign powers, Washington was slow to warm to Modi, with its ambassador to India only meeting him in February when opinion polls put the BJP leader on course to win.
Modi, 64, was denied a US visa in 2005 under the terms of a 1998 US law that bars entry to foreigners who have committed “particularly severe violations of religious freedom”.
