GENEVA (ANI)- India has strongly rejected UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk’s “unfounded and baseless” remarks on Jammu and Kashmir and Manipur, made during the 58th regular session of the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Addressing the session on March 3, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva, Arindam Bagchi, criticized the High Commissioner’s global update for its “loose terminology” and “cherry-picking” of issues.

Bagchi emphasized that India, as the world’s largest democracy, remains a vibrant and pluralistic society. He asserted that the concerns raised in the UN update were disconnected from India’s ground realities. “The people of India have repeatedly proven such misplaced concerns wrong,” he said, urging a more informed understanding of India’s diversity and openness.

“Unfounded comments in the update contrast jarringly with ground realities. India’s civil space remains robust and often cacophonous, shaped by our civilization’s ethos of diversity and openness,” he added.

Bagchi specifically addressed the reference to Jammu and Kashmir, calling it “erroneous.”

“Nothing illustrates this divergence more than the passing reference to Jammu and Kashmir, erroneously referred to as Kashmir,” he stated.

@IW