Why Do indian Muslims lag Behind ??[BBC Report]

[Kompromat]

Why do Indian Muslims lag behind?
By Soutik Biswas
BBC News




Muslims make up India's largest religious minority

As historians tell it, during India's first election in 1952, Jawaharlal Nehru was already worrying about the feeble representation of Muslims in the country's positions of authority.

Many more Muslims had stayed back in India than the millions who migrated to newly-born Pakistan after the partition just five years before.

India's first prime minister's concerns about the country's second largest religious group and the largest religious minority were eminently justified.

"There were hardly any Muslims left in the defence service, and not many in the secretariat," says historian Ramachandra Guha.

Little change

Next year, in 1953, a group of intellectuals met to discuss forming a political party for the Muslims and spoke about the low representation of Muslims in political positions and bureaucracy.

More than half century later, on India's 60th anniversary of independence, very little has changed.


Today, at over 138 million, Muslims constitute over 13% of India 's billion-strong population, and in sheer numbers are exceeded only by Indonesia's and Pakistan's Muslim community.

The country has had three Muslim presidents - a largely ceremonial role. Bollywood and cricket, two secular pan-Indian obsessions, continue to have their fair share of Muslim stars - the ruling heroes in Mumbai films are Shah Rukh, Aamir and Salman Khan, and the star of India's current English cricket tour is pace bowler Zaheer Khan. Not long ago, the national team was led by the stylish Mohammed Azharuddin.

That's where the good news essentially ends.

Muslims are a 'vulnerable' community
Muslims comprise only 5% of employees in India's big government, a recent study found. The figure for Indian Railways, the country's biggest employer, is only 4.5%.

The community continues to have a paltry representation in the bureaucracy and police - 3% in the powerful Indian Civil Service, 1.8% in foreign service and only 4% in the Indian Police Service. And Muslims account for only 7.8% of the people working in the judiciary.

Indian Muslims are also largely illiterate and poor.
At just under 60%, the community's literacy rate is lower than the national average of 65%. Only half of Muslim women can read and write. As many as a quarter of Muslim children in the age-group 6-14 have either never attended school or dropped out.

They are also poor - 31% of Muslims are below the country's poverty line, just a notch above the lowest castes and tribes who remain the poorest of the poor.


Identity card

To add to the community's woes are myriad problems relating to, as one expert says, "identity, security and equity".

"They carry a double burden of being labelled as 'anti-national' and as being 'appeased' at the same time," says a recent report on the state of Indian Muslims.

Historians say it is ironic that many Indians bought the Hindu nationalist bogey of 'Muslim appeasement' when it had not translated into any major socio-economic gain for the community.

So why has the lot of Indian Muslims remained miserable after six decades of independence?


Half of Muslim women in India cannot read or write
For one, it is the sheer apathy and ineptitude of the Indian state which has failed to provide equality of opportunity in health, education and employment.
This has hurt the poor - including the Muslim poor who comprise the majority of the community - most.


This has hurt the poor - including the Muslim poor who comprise the majority of the community - most.

There is also the relatively recent trend of political bias against the community when Hindu nationalist governments have ruled in Delhi and the states.

Also, the lack of credible middle class leadership among the Muslims has hobbled the community's vision and progress.

Consequently, rabble rousers claiming to represent the community have thrust themselves to the fore.


To be true, mass migration during partition robbed the community of potential leaders - most Muslim civil servants, teachers, doctors and professionals crossed over.

But the failure to throw up credible leaders has meant low community participation in the political processes and government - of the 543 MPs in India's lower house of parliament, only 36 are Muslims.

Also, as Ramachandra Guha says, the "vicissitudes of India-Pakistan relations and Pakistan's treatment of its minorities" ensured that Muslims remained a "vulnerable" community.


Regional disparities

The plight of Indian Muslims also has a lot to do with the appalling quality of governance, unequal social order and lack of equality of opportunity in northern India where most of the community lives.

Populous Uttar Pradesh is home to nearly a fifth of Muslims (31 million) living in India, while Bihar has more than 10 million community members.

"Southern India is a different picture. Larger cultural and social movements have made education more accessible and self employment more lucrative benefiting a large number of Muslims," says historian Mahesh Rangarajan.

In Andhra Pradesh state, for example, 68% of Muslims are literate, higher than the state and national average. School enrolment rates for Muslim children are above 90% in Kerala and Tamil Nadu


In Andhra Pradesh state, for example, 68% of Muslims are literate, higher than the state and national average. School enrolment rates for Muslim children are above 90% in Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

Mahesh Rangarajan says poverty and "absence of ameliorative policies" has hurt India's Muslims most.

If India was to be "a secular, stable and strong state," Nehru once said, "then our first consideration must be to give absolute fair play to our minority".

Regards:

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Why do Indian Muslims lag behind?

 

[Novice09]

bachey dus hi acchey...

Those who don't follow this rule whether Hindus or Muslims they aren't poor...

On lighter note:
People like Lalu Yadav are rare...

 

[BJlaowai]

The lot of the Indian muslims will start improving the day they stop listening to the mullahs and start using their common sense. Start doing family planing, stop their children from going to madrassahs and sending to secular schools

 

[prototype]

well the report is true,muslims lag far behind any other communities in india

specifically if u compare with christian and sikh community which is even smaller than them

well i think education is the biggest reason why they lag behind

 

[Raghu]

Why Do Indian Muslims lag Behind ??

The answer is simple.

Most Indian Muslim live in impoverished states like UP,Bihar,West Bengal and Assam.So obviously their socio economic status is poor like their Hindu counterparts living in the above states.There are no special discrimination or something thats holding back Muslim living there.

The avg economic position of a Memon Muslim living in the state of Gujarat is far better than Muslims of UP/Bihari, as the Gujarat state itself is very rich compared to UP or Bihar.Similarly Muslims of Kerala are better educated than Muslims living in poorer states of India.

 

[Justin Joseph]

This is all silly.

When we have given our land, a whole nation, a army, a navy, a air force, a whole economy to Muslims how one can say that.

As the majority of Muslims from army, police, business, and civil services etc. moved to pakistan obviously they will be lesser in number in other port.

The BBC of the UK, the same UK which has long history of divide and rule.

The same UK with dirty politics.

The same UK which has invaded Iraq & Afghanistan and responsible for massacre of Muslims in many parts of the world and continue to do so till date.

They just wanna fell good to they public BS articles.

 

[T-Faz]

Ok to be fair, the muslims left in India were the poor (majority of them) ones who could not travel to Pakistan.

And their low literacy rates and poverty is indication of this. In return it has to be noted that Hindus in Pakistan have higher GDP per capita than an average Pakistani and enjoy a higher quality of life. Why, because they lived in cities where they were already highly educated and had wealth which is why they did not migrate.

 

[r3alist]

The lot of the Indian muslims will start improving the day they stop listening to the mullahs and start using their common sense.

yes, because every muslim person is an air tight container of what your simple mind beleives them to be??

maybe their lot will be better when there are less bigots like you around???

 

[makikirkiri]

1)no family planning
2)no due importance to education
3)early marriages
4)most have been mislead by political parties reinforcing religious identities over national thus confining them into mental ghettos far far away from the3 national mainstream
(like congress)

 

[r3alist]

1)no family planning
2)no due importance to education
3)early marriages
4)most have been mislead by political parties reinforcing religious identities over national thus confining them into mental ghettos far far away from the3 national mainstream

another one who has met every muslim in india

 

[Avatar]

Ok to be fair, the muslims left in India were the poor (majority of them) ones who could not travel to Pakistan.

And their low literacy rates and poverty is indication of this. In return it has to be noted that Hindus in Pakistan have higher GDP per capita than an average Pakistani and enjoy a higher quality of life. Why, because they lived in cities where they were already highly educated and had wealth which is why they did not migrate.

Stop making BS speculation. Ask this to the Muslims and they will tell you the true story. You are just jealous because the idea of Pakistan fails if Muslims are happy in India.

The Indian Minorities have more rights than the Hindus, so there is no question about opportunities.

If you have to make any claims, then give a valid source. They did not migrate to Pakistan because they REJECTED the idea of Pakistan.. and now they are very thankful they did.

Besides, when one Hindu progresses, Muslim progresses, or Christian progresses, the whole INDIA progresses. We are not Hindus, Muslims, Christians. We are proud Indians. India is based on unity in diversity and that is the source of our national strength, and nobody can break it now. We are ONE.

 

[hillman32]

The Rajinder Sachar Committee, appointed by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India was a high level committee for preparation of a report on the social, economic and educational status of the Muslim community of India.
It prepared a 403-page report that was tabled in Parliament on 30 November 2006 – 20 months after obtaining the terms of reference from the PMO.[1] It has come-up with this report with suggestions and solutions to include and mainstream Indian Muslims.

Main findings of the report

The entire Sachar Report is available for download at various websites.
Some findings are as follows: A..Sachar committee has put a lot of analysis about the Indian Muslim with "statistical reports" based on information from government agencies, banks, Indian Minority Commission, different state governments and its agencies. The major points covered in the reports are:
In the field of literacy the Committee has found that the rate among Muslims is very much below than the national average. The gap between Muslims and the general average is greater in urban areas and women. 25 per cent of children of Muslim parents in the 6-14 year age group have either never attended school or have dropped out.
Muslim parents are not averse to mainstream education or to send their children to affordable Government schools. The access to government schools for children of Muslim parents is limited.
Bidi workers, tailors and mechanics need to be provided with social safety nets and social security. The participation of Muslims in the professional and managerial cadre is low.
The average amount of bank loan disbursed to the Muslims is 2/3 of the amount disbursed to other minorities. In some cases it is half. The Reserve Bank of India’s efforts to extend banking and credit facilities under the Prime Minister’s 15-point programme of 1983 has mainly benefited other minorities marginalizing Muslims.
There is a clear and significant inverse association between the proportion of the Muslim population and the availability of educational infrastructure in small villages. Muslim concentration villages are not well served with pucca approach roads and local bus stops.
Substantially larger proportion of the Muslim households in urban areas are in the less than Rs.500 expenditure bracket.
The presence of Muslims has been found to be only 3% in the IAS, 1.8% in the IFS and 4% in the IPS.
Muslim community has a representation of only 4.5% in Indian Railways while 98.7% of them are positioned at lower levels. Representation of Muslims is very low in the Universities and in Banks. Their share in police constables is only 6%, in health 4.4%, in transport 6.5%.
For the Maulana Azad Education Foundation to be effective the corpus fund needs to be increased to 1000 crores. Total allocation in the four years 2002 to 2006 for Madarsa Modernization Scheme is 106 crores. The information regarding the Scheme has not adequately percolated down. Even if the share of Muslims in elected bodies is low they and other under represented segments can be involved in the decision making process through innovative mechanisms.
Most of the variables indicate that Muslim-OBCs are significantly deprived in comparison to Hindu-OBCs. The work participation rate (WPR) shows the presence of a sharp difference between Hindu-OBCs (67%) and the Muslims. The share of Muslim-OBCs in government/ PSU jobs is much lower than Hindu-OBCs.
There are about 5 lakh registered Wakfs with 600,000 acres (2,400 km&#178 land and Rs 6,000 crore book value.

Removal of common stereotypes

The Sachar committee helped in a big way to expose stereotypes that had been used by right wing communal groups as part of their propaganda[8]. Some of these important findings were
Only four per cent of Muslims students actually go to madrasas primarily because primary state schools do not exist for miles. Therefore, the idea that Muslims prefer madrasa education was found to be not true.
That there is “substantial demand from the community for fertility regulation and for modern contraceptives” and over 20 million couples are already using contraceptives. “Muslim population growth has slowed down as fertility has declined substantially”. This clarifies and puts an end to any propaganda that there has been a Muslim conspiracy afoot since 1947 to reproduce mightily, and that a danger that the Indian Hindus will be reduced to a minority due to high birth rate of Muslims.
That Muslims wherever spoken to complained of suffering the twin calumnies of being dubbed “anti-national” and of being “appeased”. However, the Indian Muslim community as a whole had never indulged in anti-national activities and the conditions borne out by the committee's findings clearly explained that no "appeasement" had taken place.

Summary of recommendations

The report put forward some recommendations to eliminate the situation raised for Indian Muslim. Justice Sachar explained that the upliftment minorities and implementation of these recommendations would strengthen the secular fabric of Indian society as well as increase patriotism due to their all inclusive progress. The recommendation include:
Mechanisms to ensure equity and equality of opportunity and eliminate discrimination.
Creation of a National Data Bank (NDB) where all relevant data for various Socio Religious Communities are maintained.
Form an autonomous Assessment and Monitoring Authority to evaluate the extent of development benefits
An Equal Opportunity Commission should be constituted to look into the grievances of the deprived groups.
Elimination of the anomalies with respect to reserved constituencies under the delimitation scheme.
The idea of providing certain incentives to a diversity index should be explored to ensure equal opportunities in education, governance, private employment and housing.
A process of evaluating the content of the school textbooks needs to be initiated and institutionalized.
The UGC should evolve a system where part of the allocation to colleges and universities is linked to the diversity in the student population.
Providing hostel facilities at reasonable costs for students from minorities must be taken up on a priority basis.
The Committee recommended promoting and enhancing access to Muslims in Priority Sector Bank Advances.
The real need is of policy initiatives that improve the participation and share of the Minorities, particularly Muslims in the business of regular commercial banks.
The community should be represented on interview panels and Boards. The underprivileged should be helped to utilize new opportunities in its high growth phase through skill development and education.
Provide financial and other support to initiatives built around occupations where Muslims are concentrated and have growth potential.[7][9]
The Committee made no recommendation of “reservations” per se, but suggests that those among the minority communities who approximate in terms of social and occupational status the scheduled and backward classes among Hindus be classified as Most Backward Castes and proferred the same benefits that relevant Articles of the Constitution make available to counterparts among Hindus.

 

[T-Faz]

Stop making BS speculation. Ask this to the Muslims and they will tell you the true story. You are just jealous because the idea of Pakistan fails if Muslims are happy in India.

The Indian Minorities have more rights than the Hindus, so there is no question about opportunities.

If you have to make any claims, then give a valid source. They did not migrate to Pakistan because they REJECTED the idea of Pakistan.. and now they are very thankful they did.

Besides, when one Hindu progresses, Muslim progresses, or Christian progresses, the whole INDIA progresses. We are not Hindus, Muslims, Christians. We are proud Indians. India is based on unity in diversity and that is the source of our national strength, and nobody can break it now. We are ONE.

idiot, read the article and then talk. Thats article seems to hit where it hurts you the most. Muslim progress, yes I can see that.

 

[T-Faz]

Read this and learn that the Elite Muslim class of India moved to Pakistan. The poor and some of the wealthy (to look after business and property) were left behind.

http://www.jstor.org/pss/4400229

Let me give you a famous example. Saif Ali Khan's father stayed behind because of their land and interest in Haryana. But all their other family moved to Pakistan, such as General Sher Ali Khan (Saif's uncle). Similarly the first muslim president of india, his daughter is married to Pakistani General and Chief Marshall Rahimuddin Khan.

Get a clue buddy.

 

[Skeptic]

Ok to be fair, the muslims left in India were the poor (majority of them) ones who could not travel to Pakistan.

And their low literacy rates and poverty is indication of this. In return it has to be noted that Hindus in Pakistan have higher GDP per capita than an average Pakistani and enjoy a higher quality of life. Why, because they lived in cities where they were already highly educated and had wealth which is why they did not migrate.

I think a fair argument about Indian Muslims, also as Raghu pointed out, they are concentrated in the impoverished states of UP and Bihar. The article also emphasizes how muslims in other states are doing better than national averages. Even for few of my muslim friends - their relatives who migrated to Pakistan were of better financial stature than them at the time(1947). Although I can not prove it via links, but seems a fair assessment that those who migrated financially better and those who did not were generally poor.

Also, I think a muslims lost a majority of their leadership - when some of their prominent leaders and their families also migrated during partition. This would explain lack of their representation in Parliament as we are very well aware how dynasty plays an important role in Politics in subcontinent.

About Pakistani Hindus - I think it is off topic and no further comments.