Hindu American Foundation challenges California over linking caste bias to Hinduism in US appeals court

The Hindu American Foundation (HAF) has petitioned a US appeals court to reinstate a lawsuit against the California Civil Rights Department, claiming the state regulator unconstitutionally links caste discrimination specifically to Hinduism and South Asian identity. This legal challenge stems from the department’s high-profile 2020 case against Cisco Systems and two managers, where the regulator described caste as a strict Hindu social and religious hierarchy. Although California officials later removed that specific phrasing from their complaint, HAF maintains that the underlying enforcement strategy continues to unfairly target and stereotype a religious minority, effectively treating South Asian employees with a different set of standards than other ethnic groups. The foundation argues that by institutionalizing this link, the state creates a hostile environment and promotes false tropes about the Indian diaspora. The outcome of this appeal in the Ninth Circuit is expected to have significant implications for how US civil rights laws interpret the intersection of caste, religion, and ethnicity in the modern workplace.