In 2025, hate speech against religious minorities, mainly Muslims and Christians, rose by 13 per cent from 2024 and by 97 per cent from 2023, with a majority of the incidents occurring in states ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi‘s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), according to an India Hate Lab report released on Tuesday, January 13.
The report said the increase in hate speech observed in 2025 indicated the normalisation of “narrow-minded rhetoric” in India’s political and social landscape. “Such rhetoric now functions as a round-the-clock instrument for Hindu far-right mobilisation on the ground,” the report read.
It alleged that hate speech in 2025 was led by the “majoritarian ideological project” of the ruling BJP and its allies in Hindu nationalism, who have moved to the centre stage for spreading hate speech.