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Muslims are poor in Muslim majority State
Naseer A Ganai
(from greaterkashmir)
Srinagar, Sept 13: In the Muslim majority State of Jammu and Kashmir the incidence of poverty is higher among Muslims and higher number of families below the poverty line is from the Muslim majority districts.
This has been revealed by the BPL survey released by the Directorate of Economics and Statistic few days ago.
In the survey, Ramban, Kishtiwar, Poonch and Reasi districts of Jammu region have been identified as poorest. Ramban, Kishtiwar, Poonch, Kishtiwar have majority Muslim population. In fact 2001 census says the Muslim population of Poonch is 91.92 percent.
In Kashmir division, Kupwara and Bandipora in north Kashmir and Kargil in Leh division have been identified as poorest districts.
At the State level (Rural+Urban) the BPL population comprises 22.68 percent of the total population of the State with distribution of 17.76 percent Muslims, 4.63 percent Hindus, 0.20 percent Buddhists, 0.08 percent Sikhs and 0.01 percent Christians.
The study says that the total BPL population when compared with the corresponding religion-wise population exhibited the dispersion of faith with 24.51 percent in case of Islam, 18.14 percent in Hinduism, 24.50 percent in Buddhism, 7.51 percent and 3.12 in case of Sikhism and Christianity.
On the basis of absolute BPL population and absolute BPL household, the seven poorest districts in the State are Varmul, Kupwara in north Kashmir, Budgam in central Kashmir, Poonch, Rajouri in Jammu and Pulwama in south Kashmir,the study says. It reveals that at the urban level the highest BPL population percentage has been observed in district Kulgam (15.83 percent) followed by district Pulwama (14 percent.)
The study however attributes higher incidence of poverty to the illiteracy. It says, “it is explicit from the analysis of the data that the population Below Poverty Line has more illiterates than the general population in the State and the reason thereof could be multidimensional.” Then the study concludes that there is direct relationship between illiteracy and incidence of poverty.
But the conclusions drawn by the study runs contrary to the findings of the Sachar Committee report which paints an encouraging picture of the educational status of the Valley Muslims.
According to the report, the primary class enrolment of Muslim children exceeded 5.3 lakh last year with the boy-girl ratio a healthy 50.3: 49.7. The number of Muslim male literates has increased by 25 percent and the women by 23 percent over the past two decades, revealed the Sachar Committee findings.
Besides, Kashmir produces more than 16,000 Muslim graduates every year and the number of postgraduates crosses 3,000 annually. The figure for female students pursuing higher education is also encouraging. Of the 57,000 students enrolled in colleges, more than 25,000 are girls.
On the contrary, despite the hullabaloo about the proliferation of Islamic seminaries across the Valley, only 2691 students 950 of them girls are enrolled in the Darul Ulooms.
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