Rewind: Are Hindus in danger?

No matter what the staunch supporters of Sangh Parivar, supposed guardian of Hindu interests, preach, the population of Muslims in India will not exceed the population of Hindus

by Delamella

Hyderabad: A few days ago, I was talking to two of my aunties, kind, pious, conscientious older Hindu women. They all see India’s growing Muslim population as a serious problem. Why? Because they all saw on WhatsApp that the Muslim population in India is growing so fast that Muslims will soon become the majority of the country. One aunt thinks they will be the majority by 2050, while another thinks it will happen sooner by 2035.

Not only my aunties have this fear but many other well-meaning aunts, uncles, cousins, brothers and sisters all over India. Most importantly, staunch supporters of Sangh Parivar, who is said to be the custodian of Hindu interests, are very generous in spreading this fear. More recently, Mohan Bhagwat, head of the RSS, expressed concern over the rising proportion of Muslims in the country’s population, calling it a “threat to India”. Some Hindutva supporters argue that India’s Muslim population is growing at 2.5 times the rate of Hindus and that their population will soon explode.

So, are these fears real and justified?

Baring Foundation

Here are some basics. When the total fertility rate (Total Fertility Rate, TFR) of a country or state, that is, the average number of babies born per adult woman reaches 2.1, known as the replacement level, then its population will remain stable for a period of time. If it is above 2.1 then the population will eventually grow, if it is below 2.1 then the population will eventually decrease. Growth and contraction do not happen instantly, but take decades to be reflected in population growth. For decades, many countries around the world have attempted to lower their TFRs below 2.1, fearing a growing population would become a burden.

Currently, India’s fertility rate is 2.05, which is good news. This means that India’s population will eventually start to decrease (it will continue to increase over the next three decades as it takes time to reflect the lower total fertility rate). At the same time, China’s population has begun to shrink, and the current fertility rate of 1.7 indicates that the population will shrink at a faster rate in the future.

In fact, most of the world’s developed countries have already begun to contract, with France at 1.83, the United States at 1.64, and Germany at 1.53. Japan, with a total fertility rate of 1.34, has sounded the alarm, urging its citizens to have more children. But it won’t be that easy, because prosperous societies cannot produce enough babies. As infant mortality and health care improved, as did women’s education and empowerment, families decided to have fewer children, while some women remained unmarried. The situation in South Korea, with a fertility rate of 0.84, is grim, with the prospect of an extremely shrinking population.

the biggest issue

In a few decades, one of the biggest problems facing humanity on this planet will be population decline, not population explosion.

Although India’s fertility rate currently stands at 2.05, it has been slowing rapidly over the past few decades. 5.91 in 1960, 4.83 in 1980, 3.31 in 2000, 2.58 in 2010, 2.05 in 2020, and will drop further. As in most developed countries, the main topic of debate in 2036 will be the crisis of India’s population decline. At that time, the working population will be lower than 50%, ending India’s demographic dividend period. According to the latest estimates, India’s population may peak in 2048 at 1.6 billion before starting to decline.

Southern states’ TFR is already below 2.1. Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka are at 1.7, while Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Kerala are at 1.8. However, states like Bihar 3.0 and Uttar Pradesh 2.4 continued to grow steadily. But even these states are catching up showing that the population decline is only a matter of time.

The general trend in all nations and nations of the world is that as societies and communities become more prosperous and their women educated and empowered, population growth will start to decline and soon begin to shrink.

prosperity, not community

This trend applies to all societies, including Muslims. Unlike Hindutva would have you believe that having more children is a Muslim habit, there is nothing unique about Muslims that makes them buck the tide.

Although Bangladesh is predominantly Muslim, it has a fertility rate of 2.0, which is lower than that of India. More prosperous Muslim countries have seen population declines. The United Arab Emirates (1.46), Qatar (1.82), Bahrain (1.83) and Iran (1.71) are all Muslim countries with fertility rates below 2.1. This further suggests that society depopulates regardless of religious affiliation. What matters is prosperity and the education and empowerment of women.

muslims in india

Now, let’s talk about the issue of Muslims in India. In India, all economically disadvantaged communities exhibit higher fertility rates. In 2019, TFR was 2.5 for ST, 2.4 for Muslim, 2.3 for SC and 2.2 for OBC. According to the Sachar Commission report, the socioeconomic status of Muslims in India is more or less similar to that of OBC, SC and ST, and not surprisingly, this is also reflected in their fertility rates. Thus, it is not religion but a community’s socioeconomic status that determines fertility. The poorer the community, the higher the fertility rate.

“If you want to reduce the population, please educate women,” Tamil Nadu Finance Minister PT Rajan told a forum. Thankfully, ST, Muslim, SC and OBC female literacy rates are increasing in India while their fertility rates are decreasing. In fact, the fastest decline is among Muslims, meaning they will reach a total fertility rate below 2.1 by the end of the decade. In more developed states such as Telangana, the TFR for Muslims is only 1.9, further evidence that Muslim population growth is a function of their prosperity and female literacy.

So, will Muslims become the majority in this country? not at all.

Even if we assume the worst case scenario where the growth rate of Muslims is always 2.4, which is extremely unlikely, then 260 years from now, in 2283, Muslims will be the majority in the country. But in fact, as female literacy rates increase and economic conditions improve, the growth rate of the Muslim population declines faster than any other community in India, so we will never see the above.

A key fascist agenda of Hindutava has been to create an imaginary fear based on the artificial victimization of a dominant majority against a minority

The most likely scenario is that the growth of Muslims will gradually slow down. Their current share of the Indian population was 14.2% in 2001. Even at its peak, it may not exceed 18%. It is possible to reduce even a little. In conclusion, Muslims will never be the majority in this country. Not even in the next 300 years. They will be mostly lies. It is an imagined and artificial fear.

imaginary fear

So why do so many people, including my two aunts, believe this lie? The reason so many Indians believe these fears comes from another place.

Under Hindutva, India is turning to fascism with a majoritarian agenda to push all other identities and submissions. In fact, one of the main agendas of fascism is to create an artificial and imagined fear based on the artificial harm of a powerful, dominant majority against a minority, known as the enemy within.

Nazi Germany created an artificial fear of the Jews on the grounds that the German way of life would cease to exist because of the Jews. This fear, albeit an irrational fear based on blatant lies, was so believed by millions of Germans that they eventually allowed and celebrated the disgraceful laws to subdue the Jews, which eventually led to ostracism, then boycotts, then ghetto, and then transfer them to concentration camps where nearly 6 million Jews ended up in the gas chambers.

Now a man-made fear is being created against muslims on the grounds that the muslim population in India will soon outnumber the hindus and therefore muslims need a controlled raison d’être.

The biggest danger we face is the massive polarization of this country into “us vs them” with some religions considered “enemies within” by Hinduism

The problem with such belief systems is that they are not based on real facts or evidence but only on feelings, some of us subscribe to this false notion simply because of deep-rooted prejudices against Muslims, some of which we may have inherited from our the society around us.

Crazy laws are being enacted to restrict the freedom of Muslims in this country based on artificial and imagined fears such as anti-hijab laws, love jihad laws, CAA+NRC and anti-beef laws. Muslims in this country are being marginalized, suppressed, segregated and discriminated against.

The basic reality is that the growth of Muslims is not dangerous to India or Hindus at the same rate as ST or SC or Bihar or UP. In about 25 years, the general concern will be the decline of the Muslim population, as well as the decline of the rest of the Indian population.

The greatest danger we face is the massive polarization of this country into “us versus them” where some religions are considered “enemies within” by Hindutva, which only means that we are sowing the seeds of a massive hate movement that May contain all of us including the idea of ​​destroying India.

Instead of banning them with crazy laws like hijab ban, India should focus on improving the socio-economic situation of muslims as recommended in the Sahar committee report and ensuring increased female literacy among muslim women. This will ensure that the growth rate of Muslims will be close to the average of India and their population will decrease soon.