This submission to the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism examines how artificial intelligence (AI) is being used in India’s counter-terrorism framework, with serious consequences for human rights.
Focusing on facial recognition technologies, drone surveillance, and AI-enabled security operations in regions such as Bastar and Manipur, the report shows how these tools are deployed without adequate legal safeguards, oversight, or accountability. It highlights how AI-driven policing and militarised counter-insurgency disproportionately affect Indigenous Adivasi communities, religious minorities, human rights defenders, and protesters.
The submission analyses these practices against India’s international human rights obligations, including the ICCPR and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and finds widespread violations of the rights to privacy, life, equality, freedom of expression, and effective remedy.
The report calls for urgent legal and policy reforms to regulate surveillance technologies, prevent discriminatory profiling, ensure judicial oversight, and guarantee accountability for civilian harm caused by AI-enabled security operations.
Read the full submission here