While the overall population growth in the country was 17% in the 2001-2011 decade, Muslim population growth hit a 20-year low of 24.6% in 2011, according to Census data released recently.
Hindu population growth was down to 16.75% in the decade ended 2011.
In absolute numbers, there are 966 million Hindus (79.8%) and 172 million Muslims (14.2%) in the country.
While the overall population growth of Muslims was down across the country, their share of population increased across all states.
The maximum decadal change was seen in Assam with share of population increasing 3.3 percent point to 34.2% from 30.9% in 2001.
The surprises here are the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled states – Gujarat, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh.
All the states have witnessed a decline in proportion of Hindu population, and the proportion of Muslim population has increased in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat.
UP Has Maximum Muslim Population
Uttar Pradesh, which is the most populous state of the country with 199 million people, has the most Muslims (38.4 million) in 2011.
West Bengal is the second highest with 24.6 million.
Rajasthan has seen the highest growth rate of Muslim population with 29.8%; population increased from 4.7 million in 2001 to 6.2 million in 2011.
UP was sixth in the country when it came to growth rate of Muslim population.
The lowest growth rate was seen in Kerala with 12.8%; population increased from 7.8 million to 8.8 million.
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