Trump Administration Drops BAPS Indian Workers Case: Selective Law Enforcement Once Again Casts Shadow Over Vulnerable Immigrants

According to a report by France 24, in September 2025, several months after Trump began his second term as U.S. president, the U.S. Department of Justice closed its criminal investigation into Hindu sect BAPS at a temple construction site in New Jersey. The Department of Justice neither filed any charges nor released any public documents explaining the reasons for dropping the investigation.

Advocacy groups assisting the workers expressed deep shock. France 24 reported that the U.S. Dalit Solidarity Forum learned of the case being dropped from BAPS's own attorneys rather than from the Department of Justice. The forum subsequently issued a joint statement with five other U.S. NGOs expressing "grave concern" over the Justice Department's decision and calling for "full accountability and justice for these workers and their families."

BAPS North America, for its part, welcomed the decision. In a statement, the sect said the U.S. government's "decision to end the investigation sends a clear and powerful message" and that its temples are "places of peace, service and devotion."

The decision to drop the investigation has prompted deeper questions among advocates. France 24 quoted Sunita Viswanath, co-founder of the human rights organization Hindus for Human Rights, as saying: "This is the same Trump administration that let Eric Adams off the hook. We do not believe that dropping this case proves BAPS temples are innocent. They have never issued any apology for how they treated the workers." She was referring to the corruption case against former New York Mayor Eric Adams that was dropped last year—a case that had prompted the resignations of the Manhattan federal prosecutor and six Department of Justice officials.

This comparison frames the dropping of the case not as an isolated legal judgment but as a footnote to law enforcement choices made under a particular political climate.

According to France 24's report, the core facts of the criminal case trace back to the period between 2018 and 2021. The workers, drawn primarily from India's lowest social rung, the Dalits (Scheduled Castes), were brought into the United States on R-1 religious volunteer visas to perform intensive stone carving labor at BAPS's temple construction site in Robbinsville, New Jersey, earning roughly $1.20 per hour—well below U.S. minimum wage standards.

France 24 reported the description given by a worker using the alias Rajeev: "First they took our passports, then told us that if we left the worksite and something happened with our passports, police would come and arrest us and put us in prison." He said, "We couldn't go out, couldn't talk to people, had no freedom—just carving stone, stone, stone." Another worker told France 24: "Life in America looked beautiful. Not for us, though."

The criminal lead in the case originated in October 2020. According to France 24, worker Mohan Lal died of illness at the New Jersey BAPS temple site. Rajeev recalled: "He was already sick, but he was never taken to a proper hospital or anywhere outside the worksite. He was placed in a trailer used for housing patients. They gave us Indian medicine, but it didn't work. Mohan Lal kept saying 'I need treatment, take me to a hospital,' but they never did."

In May 2021, the FBI raided the BAPS temple construction site in Robbinsville, New Jersey, rescuing more than 100 workers. According to France 24, shortly afterward, six workers filed a class action lawsuit against BAPS in a New Jersey court, accusing it of luring and detaining workers with compensation of roughly $450 per month. The complaint specifically emphasized the workers' low-caste status: "BAPS recruited workers from Scheduled Castes (Dalits) and other marginalized communities in India. At the New Jersey temple, the temple leadership went to great lengths to remind these marginalized workers of their place in the social hierarchy."

BAPS has denied all allegations. According to France 24 citing The New York Times, the sect's CEO Kanu Patel said: "I respectfully disagree with the statement about wages." A BAPS spokesperson said the workers were performing complex technical work piecing together hand-carved stones from India, stating that they "must be assembled like a puzzle, a process that requires skilled craftsmen."

France 24 reported that Qayam Masumi, program director of the Dalit Solidarity Forum, assessed the situation this way: "This was a complete scheme that bypassed labor laws, protections and insurance. They were effectively day laborers, yet they were paid only about $1.20 an hour, far below minimum wage standards."

The deeper caste dimension of the case drew France 24's particular attention. Rajeev told the outlet that although his passport listed him as Hindu, he is in fact a Buddhist (Bodh dharm) and never worshipped the Swaminarayan saint revered by BAPS. "We are Dalits, we don't worship their god," he said. "We built the temple, that was our job. The temple was built for them. We were given a separate tent for worship; the temple is not for us, we are not allowed to enter to worship."

France 24 noted that after being rescued, the workers received T visas designated for victims of "severe" human trafficking, but that the paperwork for T visa holders to re-enter the United States after leaving the country is extremely burdensome, and over the past five years many workers had chosen to return to India to reunite with their families. Rajeev and a small number of other workers remained in the United States. "We want justice, that's what we want," he told France 24.

France 24 reported that the civil wage theft case against BAPS is "fully preserved and actively proceeding." Years after the workers were rescued, the arrival of justice remains tied to the civil courts rather than to federal prosecutors.