Islam in India: history and Muslim population data

History of Islam in India

Islam started entering current India as early as the seventh century alongthe entire western Indian shore through Arab merchants. However, theland occupied by current India did not come under Muslim control until the eleventh century. This occurred during the reign of Mahmud SebükTigin al Ghaznawi; the fourth ruler of the Ghaznavid Dynasty who ruledfrom 998 to 1030. During his reign, his Dynasty extended to thenortheastern part of current India. He captured Thanesar in 1011, UttarPradesh all the way to Varanasi in 1017, Ajmer and Gujarat in 1024.

The conquest of current India continued During the Ghorid Dynasty.It was established by the brothers Ghiyasuddin (ruled 1173 to 1202) andMuízzuddin Muhammad Ghori (ruled 1202 to 1206). They capturedGujarat in 1178, then Ajmer, Delhi, Utter Pradesh, Bihar, Bengal andAssam in 1192, capturing all of north India. The rest of India, withexception of its southernmost, was captured during the second half ofthe sixteenth century by the Moghul Muslim Empire. With the fall of thisempire, some of these lands were captured by the Maratha HinduEmpire, while others remained under independent Muslim states untilthe arrival of the British

The Republic of India has an area of 3,287,263 sq km and is theseventh largest country in the world. It is also the second most populousafter China, with over a sixth of the world population. A map of India ispresented in Figure 2.5.3a. European occupation of Indian lands startedin the sixteenth century and by 1856, most of India was under Britishcontrol. India gained its independence from the UK in 1947. Based oncensus data and as shown in Table 2.5.3a, the Muslim population inBritish India increased from 40.9 million or 21.5% in 1871, to 50.1 millionor 19.7% in 1881, to 57.3 million or 20.0% in 1891, to 62.4 million or 21.2%in 1901, to 66.6 million or 21.3% in 1911, to 68.7 million or 21.7% in 1921,to 77.7 million or 22.0% in 1931, to 92.1 million or 24.0% in 1941, justbefore the partition of British India.

To get the data for the area currently controlled by India from 1871 to1891, we deduct the Muslim population of Bangladesh, Burma, andPakistan from British India. The total population from 1901 to 1941 wasobtained from the corresponding census bureau while the Muslimpopulation in 1901 till 1941 was obtained from [INH]. Accordingly, assummarized in Table 2.5.3b, the Muslim population in India increasedfrom 14.4 million or 9.6% in 1871, to 20.3 million or 9.8% in 1881, to 24.2million or 10.4% in 1891, to 29.1 million or 12.2% 1901, to 30.3 million or12.0% in 1911, to 30.7 million or 12.2% in 1921, to 35.8 million or 12.8% in1931, to 42.6 million or 13.4% in 1941, just before the partition. Afterindependence censuses, show that the Muslim population decreased to 35.4 million or 9.9% in 1951 due to forced population exchange withPakistan and related massacres. The Muslim population continuedincreasing since then, to 46.9 million or 10.7% in 1961, to 61.4 million or11.2% in 1971, to 75.6 million or 11.4% in 1981, to 102 million or 12.1% in1991, to 138 million or 13.4% in 2001, to 172 million or 14.3% in 2011.

Thus, assuming that the percentage of Muslims will continue toincrease by 0.75 of a percentage point per decade; then the Muslimpopulation is expected to remain around 0.3 billion in the second half ofthis century, reaching 17% by 2050 and 21% by 2100.

Table 2.5.3c presents the distribution of total population (P) andMuslims (M) with their percentage per Indian state and territory,respectively, since 1941. The data show that the increase of Muslimshappens in every state, albeit in various degrees. Underlined data inthese tables are estimates based on census data. For example, census datashows that the Indian Punjab had 5.33 million Muslims in 1941 butdropped to 0.29 million in 1951 due to the population exchange betweenPakistan and India that was based on religious lines. The Indian Punjablater was reduced in size, part went to Himachal Pradesh, smallterritories of Delhi and Chandigarh, and the rest where Most Muslimswere located, was split between the new Punjab state and Haryana. In2000, the states of Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand (formerly, Uttaranchal),and Jharkhand, were carved from Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh,Bihar, respectively.

Historical Muslim population dataset for India

The figures below are from the CoMPS historical dataset. Population values are expressed in thousands; 2100 is a modelled projection, not a present-day count.

For the full time series and visualisation, use the interactive map above.