Indian-Americans have condemned US President Donald Trump's remarks blaming "both sides" for the Charlottesville violence and termed his defence of neo- Nazi groups and white supremacists as a "disgrace".


Trump had come under fire from both Republicans and Democrats for his muted response to the violence unleashed by white supremacists during a rally in Charlottesville in Virginia in which a woman was killed and 19 others were injured when a car ploughed into a crowd of counter- protesters.


The president reverted yesterday to his initial position that both left and right-wing extremists became violent during the weekend rally and blamed both sides including the "alt- left".


"I think there's blame on both sides. If you look at both sides - I think there's blame on both sides. I have no doubt about it, and you don't have any doubt about it either. And if you reported it accurately, you would say," Trump said.


Indian-American Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi said the US knew the price of hate too well to deny it, to marginalise it, or to accept David Duke's twisted view of the world.


"I condemn in the strongest possible terms any moral equivalency between white nationalists and those who would peacefully oppose them," he said yesterday.


"Thousands of Americans made the ultimate sacrifice in the quest to rid the world of tyranny, oppression and injustice. It is a disgrace to the legacy of those brave men and women -- living and dead -- for the President to in any way accommodate values so antithetical to those of their nation," Krishnamoorthi said.


He lamented that it took Trump two days to denounce neo- Nazis, members of the Ku Klux Klan, and other white supremacists and then doubling down on blaming both sides for the violence and defending people who chanted anti-Semitic slogans in a torch-lit rally.