Fact and Fiction on Hindutva claims re 'a dying race' (R B Bhagat)

Economic and Political Weekly
September 25, 2004 (Census 2001 and religion data)

Fact and Fiction

Since 1901, passions have been inflamed after every census that the Hindus are becoming 'a dying race' in India. History is repeating itself in 2004. Those who abuse demography for communal ends do not recognise the facts: in recent years the rate of acceptance of family planning practices has been rising faster among Muslims than among the Hindus and fertility has been falling more rapidly among the Muslims. The articles in this special section examine various aspects of the ongoing controversy

by R B Bhagat

The beginning of the 21st century marked a significant change in the sphere of census enumeration in India and abroad. The British census incorporated a question on religion in 2001 Census after a strong pressure to include religion in 1991 Census [Peach 1999, 2000; Bhagat 2003].

On the other hand, from India’s first census in 18721 to 1931, the question on religion was asked and data published on the size, growth, literacy and occupational status of the population cross-classified by religion. After independence, the question on religion was continued to be asked as it was necessary to identify the scheduled castes [Mahatme 1985] who could only belong to Hindus and Sikhs initially, and Buddhists since 1990.2 However, the publication of data on education and occupation by religion was discontinued after independence and reintroduced only in 2001.

Over the past few years there has been a strong demand to publish the socio-economic data on education and occupation according to religion. The 2001 Census must be commended for publishing literacy and work participation data by religion for the first time in independent India. It has been argued elsewhere that the lack of appropriate data sustains myths and prejudices [Bhagat 2001].

It has been a feature in census history that after each census, communal passions have flared up. A similar situation arose at the beginning of the 20th century when the 1901 Census revealed a decline in the growth rate of Hindu population. This led to the articulation of a demographic theory of Hindus as a dying race [Mukherji 1909]. The fear of Hindus being outnumbered has since then erupted after almost every census. Concerns have been raised that a higher fertility among Muslims is essentially rooted in Islam and that Muslim men can have four wives. It has been clarified that Islam is not against family planning [Khan 1978; Tantawai 1988] and that polygamy is not necessarily related to high fertility. On the contrary, it is found that women in polygamous marriages have lower fertility [Bongaarts, Frank and Lesthaeghe 1984]. Furthermore, it is also not true that the prevalence of polygamous marriages is higher among Muslims compared to Hindus [Census of India 1971]. E A Gait, the census commissioner of 1911 Census had observed almost a century ago, “a Muhammadan may have four wives, but he also in practice is generally monogamous. As a rule, it is only the comparatively rich who indulge in the luxury, if such it should prove, of a second wife” [Gait 1913:246].

At the popular level, it is difficult for people to take cognisance of the fact that fertility in Indonesia with majority Muslims population is lower (total fertility rate3 2.6) than India with majority Hindu population (total fertility rate 3.2) [UN 2002]. The decline in fertility in Indonesia has been possible through vigorous family planning, well-integrated with the healthcare provisions in the country. Recently, fertility decline in Bangladesh has been much faster following an increased level of family planning [Das Gupta and Narayana 1997]. In the Indian situation, the role of factors like literacy and education, type of occupations, access to jobs in the organised sector and access to quality family planning services in explaining fertility differences between religious groups have not been properly emphasised. This is partly due to the lack of adequate data and partly because of the persistence of the stereotypes about the Muslim community which have been sustained by communal polarisation.

The National Family Health Survey-2 (NFHS-2) shows that only 2 per cent of women oppose the use of family planning on the ground of religion [International Institute for Population Sciences and Macro 2000:159]. The report further brought out the fact that there is a high unmet need of family planning among Muslims (22 per cent) compared to Hindus (15 per cent). The unmet need for both spacing methods (like condom, IUD and pill) and terminal methods (sterilisation) is higher among Muslims than Hindus. It is therefore evident that the demand for family planning among Muslims is less satisfied [International Institute for Population Sciences and Macro 2000:171] and it is wrong to believe that Muslims are not willing to accept family planning on account of their religion. Further, more Muslims than Hindus get family planning services from private sources [Mishra 2004]. This raises an important question about the responsibility of the state in making the family planning services accessible to the larger Muslim population. The 2001 Census shows that Muslims are much behind the Hindus in both levels of literacy and work participation rates. The level of literacy was 65 per cent among Hindus compared to 59 per cent among Muslims. The gap in work participation between Hindus (40.4 per cent) and Muslims (31.3 per cent) was even wider. Thus, it is no doubt that the socio-economic conditions of the Muslims are worse than average. On the other hand, the lower socio-economic status of the Muslim community is also coupled with the failure of the state to provide family planning services to them. In this situation, it is likely that Muslim fertility will be little higher than among the Hindus. However, the differential between Hindus and Muslim fertility is not very large. The two rounds of NFHS surveys show that on the average Muslim women reproduce one child more than Hindu women. Further, it is very important to note that between the two surveys (NFHS-1 and NFHS-2), the fertility decline among Muslims (18 per cent) was faster than among the Hindus (16 per cent). The total fertility rate among Hindus declined from 3.3 to 2.78 between two surveys during 1992-93 to 1998-99, compared to the decline of 4.41 to 3.59 among Muslims during the same period. Also, the increase in the use of modern family planning methods among Muslims was very high (37 per cent) compared to the increase among Hindus (17 per cent) during the period 1992-93 to 1998-99. Among the Hindus 37.7 per cent reported a current use of modern family planning methods in 1992-93, which increased to 44.3 per cent in 1998-99 – compared to 30.2 per cent among Muslims in 1998-99, up from 22 per cent in 1992-93. These figures of a higher increase in the acceptance of family planning and also a faster fertility decline among Muslims are generally glossed over outside the academia. On the other hand, efforts are made now and then to inject demographic issues into the communal discourse.

Given that the population growth rate by religion is a sensitive issue and easily exploited for fomenting passions based on prejudices, it is not known why the census released the unadjusted growth rates showing that the growth rate of Muslims increased between 1981-91 and 1991-2001, while the Hindu growth rate has declined (The Times of India, September 7, 2004:1). It is a matter of common sense that as the census was not held in Assam in 1981 and in Jammu and Kashmir in 1991, the inclusion of these two states in the calculation of growth rates was bound to distort the picture. However, the census has a long history of providing credible data and taking into cognisance even small deviations such as that census enumeration was not held in several villages in Gujarat due to earthquake or where there were changes in the administrative boundaries.

The census has usually provided adjusted figures and growth rates. While releasing the provisional figures of 2001 Census nearly three years ago, the growth rate of India’s population during 1991-2001 was not presented in terms of unadjusted or adjusted rates, but the document gave only one figure of India’s population growth rate (21.34 per cent) after taking cognisance of the population of Jammu and Kashmir where the census could not be held in 1991 [Census of India 2001]. The publication of unadjusted growth rates is unusual in census history, which has painted a wrong picture about Muslim population growth rates during 1991-2001. Anyway, the enormous damage has already been done as this has been reported in national and regional dailies across the country. While some national dailies have immediately clarified – reporting that the Muslim population growth rate in fact declined by 3.5 percentage points compared to a 2.94 percentage point decline in Hindu growth rate between the decades 1981-91 to 1991-2001 and made it clear that the Muslim growth rate had declined faster than the Hindu growth rate (The Times of India, September 8, 2004:1), it is doubtful whether the vernacular press has done so with equal alacrity and accurateness. It is now time to rectify this damage as far as possible over the regional TV channels across the country.

In the wake of the result of the Census of 1991 and 2001, an issue of cross-border migration of Muslims has also surfaced. While we know little about the cross-border migration of Muslims, in terms of numbers, we can be sure that Muslim fertility during the last decade has declined faster and the level of family planning has increased substantially during this time.

Notwithstanding the reported error in the growth rates by religion, the credibility and quality of census data remain unquestioned. The data are open to scrutiny and analysis and also available and accessible on the census web site (www.censusindia.net). Further, the 2001 Census is not only novel in terms of providing data on literacy and work participation by religion for the first time after independence, but also provides an opportunity to analyse and understand nearly 1,700 religious groups which were recorded in earlier censuses and codified in the 2001 Census. This provides an enormous opportunity to understand India’s religious and cultural diversity, if unpublished data are also made available to the concerned users.

Notes

1 It was decided by the British government as early as in 1856 to hold a census in 1861 in India. But the census could not be held due to the uprising of 1857. In 1865, the government of India and the home government again agreed that a general population census would be taken in 1871. But, the years 1867-72 were actually spent in census taking. This series of censuses was in fact known as census of 1872, which was neither a synchronous census nor covered the entire territory controlled by the British [Srivastava 1972:9].
2 Besides Hindus and Sikhs, Buddhists were also brought under the realm of scheduled castes by Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order (Amendment) Act 1990 (see Census of India 1991).
3 The total fertility rate is the average number of children that would be born alive to a hypothetical cohort of women if, throughout their reproductive years, the age specific fertility rates for the specified year remained unchanged. In short, it means the number of live births a woman is expected to bear during her entire reproductive life.
4 The exact decline in Muslim growth rate was 3.6 percentage points compared to 2.8 percentage points decline in Hindu growth rate between the decades 1981-91 to 1991-2001 (www.censusindia.net).

References

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