Human Rights Day 2025

Seventy-Five Years of the UDHR: Revisiting Human Rights Frameworks

On Human Rights Day 2025, the theme “Human Rights, Our Everyday Essentials” offers a timely reminder that these principles are not abstract ideals but foundational to daily life. Yet, the irony is palpable: India’s National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) is facing a backlog of 15,000 cases, the highest since its inception in 1993, with nearly 40% unresolved for over two years. That number underscores a troubling gap between institutional intent and operational effectiveness.

India’s Institutional Architecture on Human Rights

The NHRC was established through the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993, aiming to uphold and promote human rights as defined by the Act itself and the Constitution of India. The body consists of a chairperson (historically a retired Chief Justice of India) and members drawn from judicial and social spheres. While the NHRC has the powers of a civil court—enabling it to summon individuals, examine witnesses, and requisition public records—it lacks the binding authority needed to enforce its recommendations.

Since its inception, the NHRC has been tasked with investigating rights violations by state bodies, advising governments on policy reforms, and intervening in constitutional matters. Budgetary allocations remain modest despite expanded mandates; for fiscal 2023-24, the NHRC received ₹118 crore, a negligible proportion of overall administrative spending, raising questions about whether the funding matches its operational scope.

A worrying sign of stagnation is the absence of reform within the Act’s framework. Key provisions—such as its inability to penalize authorities who fail to implement recommendations—have remained unchanged for three decades. This impairs not only the NHRC’s efficacy but also its credibility in handling human rights violations.

The Ground Realities: Where the Framework Falters

On paper, the NHRC’s mandate appears robust. In practice, its limitations are glaring. A 2025 audit of NHRC’s caseload revealed that over 60% of complaints pertain to police excesses and custodial violence. However, fewer than 5% culminate in actionable outcomes due to resistance from state executives and bureaucratic delays. The state police machinery often plays both victim and investigator, thereby undermining impartial inquiries.

Moreover, structural gaps persist in addressing collective rights violations. Consider India’s dismal record on gender-based violence: despite constitutional protections under Articles 14, 15, and 21, the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) documented 4,05,861 cases of crimes against women in 2024—a 7% increase from the previous year. The NHRC’s interventions in these cases remain largely symbolic when deterrence through systemic change is the need of the hour.

Another area of contention is workplace safety. Ratified international norms like the International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention 155 on occupational safety are ineffectual when domestic labour enforcement agencies remain underfunded. The NHRC, despite being an advisory body in labour-related cases, has made few significant strides in advancing compliance mechanisms across industries.

Lessons from the United Kingdom: A Concrete Comparison

While India struggles with enforcement gaps, the UK provides an instructive contrast. The UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), founded in 2007, enjoys statutory powers akin to judicial enforcement. It can not only investigate public authorities but also initiate legal proceedings against governmental and corporate entities failing to uphold equality standards. Notably, the EHRC enforces The Human Rights Act, 1998, integrating the European Convention on Human Rights directly into its domestic sphere—a sharp departure from India, where NHRC recommendations are perennially unenforceable.

The EHRC also demonstrates financial prioritization: its annual budget for 2024 stood at £17.8 million, a significant investment relative to its operational scale. It is difficult to dismiss the embedded lesson: effective human rights commissions demand both autonomy and resources, neither of which the NHRC fully enjoys.

Structural Tensions: Centre-State Dynamics and Political Economy

The NHRC operates in an uneasy space between constitutional ideals and political realities. Centre-state relations, often antagonistic on sensitive issues like custodial torture, have led to mutual deflections instead of accountability. Many states—Uttar Pradesh being a notable example—fail to comply with NHRC recommendations, citing jurisdictional overreach.

Adding to this is the political economy of rights enforcement. Governments, preoccupied with electoral optics, often resist human rights discourse when it threatens entrenched state authority over coercive instruments like police forces. The NHRC’s role in addressing environmental rights violations, tied to corporate malfeasance, is constrained by its inability to independently prosecute influential industrial entities.

Towards Effective Accountability

What would success for human rights enforcement look like? First, legally binding judgment powers for the NHRC—enabling it to impose tangible penalties—must be considered. Second, budgets should reflect ambition: expanding allocations for victim rehabilitation and independent inquiries is imperative. Third, strengthening state commissions with less hierarchical dependency on central bodies could improve responsiveness.

It will also be essential to develop metrics for measuring success. The NHRC could track compliance rates for its recommendations, reduce backlogs by streamlining procedural actions, and deploy uniform databases for state-level violations. Crucially, accountability must extend beyond just state actors: non-state entities, particularly corporations, must be included in the NHRC’s ambit more comprehensively.

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