UK Hindu Bodies Reject ‘Flawed’ SOAS Leicester Inquiry; Allege Pre-determined Conclusions and Soros-Linked Bias

LEICESTER, UK | 25 February 2026 – INSIGHT UK, Hindu Forum of Britain, Hindu Council UK, and the Hindu Community Organisations Group (HCOG) of Leicester, have formally rejected the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) report into the 2022 Leicester unrest. Published on 23 February 2026, the community has dismissed the inquiry and its report as a “predetermined conclusion” that weaponises academic theory against actual victims.

A boycott of pre-determined conclusions

The Hindu community did not simply boycott or decline to participate in the SOAS inquiry, it refused to legitimise a process that was devoid of basic neutrality.

From its inception, the vast majority of Hindu organisations refused to participate in this inquiry, citing the prior public anti-Hindu positions held by several panel members. This was a principled demand for a fact-driven investigation, not a theory-led one with instilled bias.

Key Grounds for the non-participation:

Legitimate need: The Hindu community questioned the very necessity of a parallel SOAS inquiry, given that the UK Government had already commissioned an official, independent review into the 2022 Leicester violence. By launching a separate, privately-funded study, SOAS was seen as attempting to bypass the established democratic process to promote an ideological narrative.
George Soros Funding: The inquiry was backed by a £620,000 grant from George Soros’s Open Society Foundations, a network widely viewed as antagonistic towards Hindu interests. This financial backing raises critical questions about the integrity of the report’s conclusions.
The “One-Sided” Lens: Critics argue the report pathologises “Hindutva” as the root cause while erasing documented Islamist extremism and coordinated social media disinformation. It effectively downplays attacks on 105 Hindu homes, multiple Hindu Temples, and properties, treating the victims as the aggressors. It is important to note that the High Court of the UK, in its ruling on 5th August 2025, repeatedly states that there was no evidence of Hindutva involvement in the Leicester violence as claimed.
Lack of Impartiality: A fundamental concern was the clear bias among several authors and panellists. Several of them had publicly expressed positions assigning blame to Hindus prior to the investigation commencing, with some also engaging key individuals accused of spreading misinformation and inciting unrest. Further underscoring our concerns, these high-profile instigators are completely omitted from their report.
Compromised Panel: Several contributors have a documented history of attributing fault to Hindu communities in comparable contexts. The consistency between those prior positions and the report’s conclusions raises serious concerns of confirmation bias and calls into question the integrity and credibility of the entire process.
Double Standards in Academia: A fundamental flaw was the weight given to testimonies. When Hindu victim perspectives are dismissed as “propaganda” while aggressor narratives are elevated to “academic fact”, the entire process is undermined by a dangerous double standard.
Lack of Credibility: An inquiry produced without the participation of the affected community cannot deliver truth or reconciliation. It serves only to further marginalise a minority group.

Waiting for the Truth: The UK Government Inquiry

Rather than legitimising the SOAS process, major UK Hindu organisations directed their efforts toward the official UK Government inquiry led by Lord Ian Austin. The review report is awaited, and the community expects this report to:

Call out the truth regarding the coordinated nature of the attacks and identify the perpetrators.
Acknowledge people involved in spreading fake news and the use of social media in instigating violence.
Provide a true account that recognises the reality of the damage to Hindu properties and temples.

INSIGHT UK urges policymakers and the media to approach the SOAS report with extreme caution. To call for the categorisation of “militant Hindutva” as extremism, a claim devoid of factual evidence, while ignoring the documented violence faced by Hindus in Leicester, is a failure of both academia and justice. Creating such a “bogeyman” to baselessly and unjustly blame victims is a dangerous distortion that obscures the truth of the 2022 Leicester unrest.

Existing Reports

A number of independent inquiries and research were conducted to discover the truth about the Leicester violence. Including data on how misinformation and fake news were used to instigate violence against the Hindu community in Leicester. See below the reports following the inquiries:

Centre for Democracy, Pluralism and Human Rights: “Fact-finding report on Leicester violence 2022: The rise of majoritarianism and Hinduphobia” by Rashmi Samant and Chris Blackburn

[Read here] (https://www.cdphr.org/Report-Final.pdf)

The Henry Jackson Society: “Hindu-Muslim unrest in Leicester: Hindutva and the creation of a false narrative” by Charlotte Littlewood

[Read here] (https://henryjacksonsociety.org/publications/hindu-muslim-civil-unrest-in-leicester-hindutva-and-the-creation-of-a-false-narrative/)

Network Contagion Research Institute: “Cyber Social Swarming Precedes Real World Riots in Leicester: How Social Media Became a Weapon for Violence”

[Read here] (https://networkcontagion.us/reports/11-16-22-cyber-social-swarming-precedes-real-world-riots-in-leicester-how-social-media-became-a-weapon-for-violence/)

More Details

“The not-so-independent SOAS inquiry into the Leicester violence” – Published by INSIGHT UK on 24th September 2023. This piece exposes the bias of the inquiry panel and team.

[Read here] (https://insightuk.org/the-not-so-independent-soas-inquiry-into-the-leicester-violence)

Is the SOAS Leicester Report really ‘independent’?” – published by INSIGHT UK on 24th February, 2026. This article highlights factual inaccuracies and deliberate omissions of the SOAS report.

[Read here] (https://insightuk.org/is-the-soas-leicester-report-really-independent/)

“How fake news was used to incite hate and attack Hindus in Leicester” – published by INSIGHT UK on 2nd October, 2022. This report exposes the fake news, the instigators, and clarifications from the police confirming that these multiple news reports were fake.

[Read here] (https://insightuk.org/how-fake-news-was-used-to-incite-hate-and-attacks-on-hindus/)