Sachar: Gujarat, Andhra, among states with more proportionate Muslim employment; Bengal, Bihar, UP at the bottom

Muslims across India are severely under-represented in government employment, including PSUs, compared to the percentage of their population in a state. While this may not appear unusual given the overall poverty and lack of education in the community, the startling fact is that this under-representation is also evident — sometimes in more stark a fashion — in states where the political establishment has made Muslim welfare a key part of its charter.

For example, West Bengal, which has had a three-decade uninterrupted Left Front government and where almost a quarter of the population is Muslim, has one of the lowest shares of Muslims in Government employment: just 4.2%. In Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, too, the numbers of Muslims employed in the Government are dismal — less than a third of their share of population.

When it comes to Public Sector Units (PSUs), often discussed by parties as the “built-in economic safety net,” the figures are equally dismal. The highest percentage of Muslims in “higher positions” in state PSUs is in Kerala with 9.5 percent and the lowest is West Bengal which has reported 0 (zero) percent of Muslims in higher positions in state PSUs.

Gujarat, which has a record of communal tension, scores far better on both indices.

These are according to figures supplied by the state governments themselves to the Prime Minister's high-level committee, the Justice Rajinder Sachar Committee, which is working on a national survey of the social, educational and economic status of Muslims in India. The panel was scheduled to submit its report this month end but has asked for an extension and is expected to file it mid-November.

Sachar's findings, obtained by The Indian Express, show that there is no state where the representation of Muslims matches with their population share.
Such figures, experts say, raise serious questions on the limits of “progressive politics.”

“If this data is any kind of a benchmark, this not only nails the myth of appeasement, it also shows that the politics of batting for Muslims is limited to providing security and safety, and it has been unable to go beyond simply protecting their civil right to life,” said a senior member of the Sachar committee.

“States like West Bengal have provided physical security to Muslims or states like Bihar and UP have politically empowered the backward castes, including Muslims, but this isn't translating to a level playing field when it comes to jobs or economic progress.”

Andhra Pradesh is the only state which shows representation that's “fairly close,” but it's still less than the population share in the state.
Three other states that show relatively more proportionate Muslim representation in state government jobs are:
• Karnataka (Muslim population share: 12.2%, share in jobs: 8.5)
• Gujarat (Muslim population share 9.1%, share in jobs: 5.4%)
• Tamil Nadu (Muslim population share: 5.6%, share in jobs: 3.2%)

All other states show the representation of Muslims in jobs is less than half of their population share.
Amongst all states which shared data with the Sachar panel, the highest percentage of Muslims employed in the government is in Assam: 11.2%. Ironically, this is still way below their 30.9% population share.

In Kerala, too, where literacy levels are high, 10.4% of state government employees are Muslim, but this is also less than half of the share of Muslims in the population of the state.
Maharashtra too has posted a low score with simply 1.9 percent Muslims in Higher Positions. Bihar and Karnataka have 8.6 per cent in higher positions in State PSUs and Gujarat 8.5 per cent, higher than most states, but still, not even fifty percent of the population share of Muslims.

In judiciary's most crowded space, Muslims are invisible

Sachar: Andhra the only state where percentage of Muslims in judiciary higher than population share, Bengal again at bottom; we need an inclusive democracy, says ex-CJ J S Verma

Be it Education, Health, Transport, or Home, in virtually all departments of state governments, the share of Muslims employed is way below their share in the population. That's one of the key findings of the Prime Minister-appointed Justice Rajinder Sachar panel looking into the state of the Muslims in India, as first reported in The Indian Express today. But, arguably, in no other wing does this under-representation raise as many questions as in the state judiciary.

Data supplied by state governments themselves show that just as in all government jobs, there is a glaring gap between the share of Muslims in the population and their share in judicial jobs.
Ironically, in two states that have high Muslim population share, West Bengal (25.2%) and Assam (30.9%), the percentage of Muslim employees in key positions in the state judiciary is barely 5 and 9.4 respectively. This is in tune with West Bengal's dismal overall Muslim employment data as well.

The “judiciary” for which the Sachar Committee asked for data includes officers at all levels, from Advocate Generals and District & Session Judges to Additional District & Session Judges, Chief Judicial Magistrates, Principal Judges, Munsifs, Public Prosecutors, and even Group A, B, C & D employees in lower courts.
These officers constitute the basic foundation of the justice-delivery system in the country. Public Prosecutors are lawyers representing the government, District and Sessions Judges hear both criminal and civil cases. The lower judiciary has a state-level examination and some get elevated to District Session Judges and Additional District Session Judges.

There are differences across states: for example, in UP, all civil disputes first go to the Munsif, whereas in Delhi all disputes over Rs 20 lakh go to the High Court but the rest all to the lower courts. Apart from being the first port of call for litigants, lower courts are where the bulk of litigation goes on — the Standing Committee of Home Affairs had estimated that about 80% of all pending matters are being heard in these district and subordinate courts.

The overall figure of merely 7.8% Muslim employees in this crucial area in the 12 high-Muslim population states surveyed at this level is a problem, admit experts. Says jurist Fali Nariman; “It is not just in multi-cultural democracies like ours that people feel the need to be represented adequately. Even in Australia, with far less diversity than India, for many years, people of Western Australia felt totally neglected as they had no representation in their highest Court. The judiciary at all levels in India caters to the administrative needs of the entire nation, which includes several religions and ethnic groups. Therefore, the judiciary should be reflective of a broader spectrum of experience, and at all levels.”

Even in Jammu and Kashmir, with the highest Muslim population share (66.97%), the Muslim share in the judiciary is just 48.3%.Andhra Pradesh has a unique record: Muslims there make up 12.4% of the judiciary as compared with their population share of of 9.2% — a higher than proportionate representation, unmatched by any other state.

This is worrying not because Muslim judicial officers would be expected to look after their own. Some, if not most, of the finest judgments of the Supreme Court or even independent judges on matters of social and religious violence and strife have not been taken by a “Muslim” bench: be it the matter of the Gujarat riot cases being re-tried or even the landmark Justice Srikrishna Report on the Bombay riots.
Yet, says former Chief Justice of India Justice J S Verma: “It's not democracy alone that can sustain a society like India. It has to be an inclusive democracy. Democracy can last and be resilient only if all sections of society are taken along.”

Prison is the only place where Muslims are over-represented

Muslim percentage of inmates in jails in states as high as their share in population; in many states, including Gujarat, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Karnataka, it's even higher: Sachar panel data

In sharp contrast to education and employment, where their share is way, way below their share of the population, Muslims have a disproportionately high representation when it comes to being in prison.
In fact, in many states, Muslims even make up a higher percentage of the population in jail than they do outside.

This statistic, a key finding of the Prime Minister-appointed Justice Rajinder Sachar committee — which is looking into the status of Muslims nationwide — has major social and political implications. Such a high figure of incarceration, experts say, means further marginalisation of the community, deepening prejudice and distrust.
While there is no break-up of the nature of the crime for which these inmates have been imprisoned, sources said the total number of inmates surveyed is 102, 652 and a majority of them are not in for terrorism.

A dozen states with significant Muslim population shares were asked to furnish statistics on the number of Muslims in prison, convicted and under-trials. West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Andhra Pradesh have not reported back to the committee on this so the data available is only for eight states that did.
Incidentally, West Bengal, UP and Bihar, as was first reported in The Indian Express this week, rank at the bottom when it comes to representation of Muslims in Government employment, including state public sector undertakings and the lower judiciary.

Data accessed by The Sunday Express shows that when it comes to Muslims in the prison population, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Kerala are the most disproportionate.
• In Maharashtra, the percentage of Muslim jail inmates in all categories (see chart) is way above their share in the population (Muslim share in population is 10.6%, share in the total prison inmates is 32.4%.
• When it comes to those in prison for less than a year, Muslims contribute 40.6% of all prisoners in Maharashtra.
• In Gujarat, the percentage of Muslims in the state is just 9.06% but they make up over a quarter of all jail inmates.
• Assam, the second highest Muslim populated state in the country, after J&K, has 30.9% Muslims, and here, the percentage of Muslim jail inmates is 28.1.
• Even Karnataka, which did relatively better than other states in providing jobs to Muslims, shows the same
trend: 17.5% of its jail inmates are Muslim as compared with 12.23% of its population.

The debate over these numbers is a complex one. Says Prakash Singh, the former Director General of the Border Security Force and whose PIL prompted the Supreme Court to press for police reforms last month: “There is unjust suspicion against the police. In cases of terror attacks or communal riots, if the police goes after the perpetrators of the violence, and they happen to be mostly Muslim, you cannot, in the name of secularism, expect the police to act in proportion to their population.”

Others say poverty is one main factor behind this trend. According to the Sachar committee findings, the poverty level in Muslims in urban areas is as high as 44% compared to the national figure of 28%.
Says former bureaucrat and now Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah: “The higher numbers of Muslims in jails is also a reflection of the fact that Muslims are poorer generally and are more likely to get picked on by the police because they are easy prey due to fewer entitlements. Prejudice against them also exists but gets compounded because of their poverty.”

For former member of Parliament Syed Shahabuddin, who is also president of Muslim organisation Majlis-e-Mushawarat, there is a parallel here between Muslims in India and African Americans in the United States.
“Muslims are very well represented in marginal professions, like cinema and the media, and also in goonda-gardi, as they have no openings in formal jobs,” he says.

“What are they supposed to do? They, therefore, end up in police stations more frequently and get involved in things they should not be involved in. It's like the African-Americans in the US. Their proportionate share in jails is much more than their population share. With less opportunities, crime is a vocation.”
Shahabuddin also attributes the high Muslim prison figures to what he calls bias in the police and the inaccessibility to legal aid. “The belief that Muslims are terrorists is only a product of the anti-Muslim bias the police have. If Muslims are involved, they pick up ten in place of one. Invariably, they make arrests when not necessary, and eventually, they cannot prove the cases.”

Schools, jobs, poverty, land ownership: on all these counts, Muslims worse off than OBCs

If Muslims are worse off than Scheduled Castes when it comes to education, they significantly trail behind Other Backward Classes (OBCs) virtually across the board: education, employment, poverty levels and landholdings.

OBCs also include Muslim OBCs. (For example, Noniya, Dhuniya, Chirimar and Bhishtis etc, considered to constitute close to a half of the Muslim population although this share is a heavily disputed one).
Muslim OBCs not only trail the non-OBC Muslim (the “General Muslim”), they are worse off than Hindu OBCs in all categories.

These are among the findings from the data based on the 61st round of the NSSO survey and inputs from states. Member Secretary of the Sachar Committee economist Abusaleh Sharif told The Indian Express: “(These) NSSO statistics demonstrate general Muslims are well below the status of Hindu OBCs.”
This acquires significance given the current debate over quotas for OBCs in higher education and the political resistance to the idea of excluding quotas for a “creamy layer.”

Clarifying that his opinion was personal, Sharif, who has shared some this data in a paper with the National Knowledge Commission last month, said: “There is no time like the present, when the world wants Indians. Why don't we want our own people? A deadly mix of prejudice and poor economic conditions have held back Muslims, poor OBCs (both Hindu and others) and SC/STs constituting large sections of the population. Unshackling the energies and talents of these groups is ultimately what the Indian miracle will need to be premised on.”

The data tabulated indices for levels of education (matriculation, graduates and above), employment (workers and formal sector), economic (poverty and land holdings) between Hindu OBCs, General Muslims and Muslim OBCs, and compared them with the standard all-India average (See red line in chart).
The distance from this average red line of the various bars indicates the extent of deprivation, or deviation for that particular group, from the standard all-India average for that variable.

• For matriculation, graduation, formal sector employment, all OBCs are below the all-India average.
• When it comes to non-formal employment, poverty levels and landholdings, Hindu OBCs are better than even the national average
• Muslim OBCs fare poorer than Hindu OBCs in all categories
• General Muslims are the worst off, trailing both Hindu and Muslim OBCs.

The differentials between General Muslims and Hindu OBCs are particularly large for the poverty index, for landholdings and for employment in the formal sector. Poverty and land ownership have an impact on both the economic and social status of the communities and experts say are key variables while assessing overall status of any community, or gauging the potential for social mobility of members of that community.
As reported by this newspaper since Friday, the Sachar Committee has found that the share of Muslims in government jobs and in the lower judiciary in any state simply does not come anywhere close to their population share. The only place where Muslims can claim a share in proportion to their population is in prison. In some states like Maharashtra, the share of Muslim inmates to the total is as high as over 40 per cent (the share of Muslims in the state is just 10.6 per cent).

“The Missing Muslim Part - I, II, III &IV” by Ms Seema Chisti reprinted from The Indian Express, 27.10.06, 28.10.06, 29.10.06 & 31.10.06 respectively© 2006 with the permission of Indian Express Newspapers