In times when the news of Muslims being lynched are making headlines almost every other day, some politicians are fanning baseless fears with claims of the Muslim population threatening to surpass the Hindu population in the country.
Ballia BJP MLA Surendra Singh recently went on camera to say that Muslims keep “50 wives and give birth to 1050 children”.
“This is not a tradition but an animalistic tendency,” he told reporters on Sunday, 14 July.
Last week, on Thursday, 11 July, a few BJP leaders, including Giriraj Singh and his supporters, assembled at Jantar Mantar to demand a Population Control Law, where their remarks directly targeted the Muslim community.
Giriraj Singh openly said that he wants a law to tackle the problem of rising non-Hindu population. Participants of the rally were also of the opinion that Muslims are reproducing in large numbers to take over the country.
Another shocker came from former Kerala DGP TP Senkumar who, while inaugurating a public function on Monday, 15 July, said that Hindu population in Kerala is declining.
“If this happens, Hindus from Maharashtra will have to be brought for Hindu functions,” he said.
This is not the first time Senkumar breached the topic. He had, in 2017, remarked on the ‘high birth rate’ in the Muslim community in Kerala.
What Does the Population Census Say?
Now, time for some facts.
The 2011 census puts the Muslim population at 17.22 crore, or 14.22 percent, of India’s total population. The growth rate of population of Hindus between 2001-2011 was 16.8 percent, and for Muslims, it was 24.6 percent. The Hindu growth rate was 1.55 percent annually for this decade, while Muslim growth rate was 2.2 percent, reported Livemint. This is where the fear of Muslims taking over the country comes from.
However, the figures for the previous decade (1991-2001) are an annual 1.8 percent for Hindus and 2.6 percent for Muslims, which means the growth percentage of Muslims are also on the decline.
Assuming this growth rate persists, by 2061, Muslims will constitute 29.24 crore people in India, while Hindus will be 140.25 crore in number.
So, there is no possibility for the Muslim population to surpass that of Hindus in India any time soon.
What Twitter Had To Say
Figures like ‘50 wives, 1050 children’ instill fear in the minds of the majority community. And needless to say, things worsen for Muslims, who are already looked at with suspicion and distrust.
Tweeple had a lot to say about these speeches of the Muslim population overtaking the Hindu population.
One Twitter user said “a repeated lie becomes the truth especially for the politically unaware.”
Another Twitter user said leaders like Surendra Singh are openly spewing venom against Muslims.
One Twitter user said this is a ‘preposterous propaganda’ and not true.
Twitterati tried to debunk this ‘Muslim takeover’ myth with figures from Pew Research Center that shows even if Indian Muslim community expands faster than Hindu population, Hindus will constitute 76.7 percent of Indians in 2050.
One Twitter user remarked on this dangerous trend saying, “a genocide is brewing in India”.
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