Islam in Sri Lanka: history and Muslim population data

History of Islam in Sri Lanka

The Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is an island nation withtotal area of 65,610 sq km and its map is presented in Figure 2.5.7a. Islamentered it in the seventh century through Arab traders from the southernArabian Peninsula. Then the number of Muslims increased as Islamspread in India during the thirteenth century and onward. The Islandwas occupied by the Portuguese in 1502, which lost it to the Dutch in1658, which in turn lost it to the British between 1796 and 1815. TheIsland gained its independence from the UK in 1948. It changed its namefrom Ceylon in 1972. The Dutch settled Muslims from Java here, andtheir descendants remain in Sri Lanka to this day.

Sri Lanka is divided into nine provinces; each consists of severaldistricts. The distribution of Muslims per province since 1871 is providedin Table 2.5.7a which presents the distribution of total population (P) andMuslims (M) with their percentage (M%) and ratio of total Muslims inthe country (MR) per province. The Table shows that there was not asignificant change in the concentration and distribution of Muslims inthe past century and a half. Almost a third of the Muslim populationlives in Eastern Province where they make over a third of the population.Over a quarter of the Muslim population resides in Western Province,where the capital Colombo is located, and they make almost a tenth ofthe total population of the province. Over a quarter of the Muslimpopulation is split in Central and North Western provinces, where themake over a tenth of the population in each province.

The Northern Province consists of five districts: Jaffna, Kilinochchi,Mannar, Mullaitivu and Vavuniya, while the Eastern Province consistsof three districts: Ampara, Batticaloa and Trincomalee. In 2001, all thesedistricts except Ampara were under control of Tamil Tigers who led aseparation movement between 1983 and 2009 to establish an ethnicbased country named Tamil Eelam. In 1990, Tamil Tigers expelledMuslims from most of the Northern Province except Vavuniya Districtwhich was mostly under Sri Lankan government control. However, some of those expelled Muslims returned in mid-1990s. The totalpopulation in 2001 in the districts outside government control wasofficially estimated based on the 2012 census, while Muslim populationis estimated by assuming growth same to population growth in eachdistrict where the data is missing.

Based on census data and as shown in Table 2.5.7b, the Muslimpopulation increased from 0.17 million or 7.2% in 1871, to 0.20 million or7.1% in 1881, to 0.21 million or 7.1% in 1891, to 0.25 million or 6.9% in1901, to 0.28 million or 6.9% in 1911, to 0.30 million or 6.7% in 1921, to0.35 million or 6.7% in 1931, to 0.44 million or 6.6% in 1946, to 0.54million or 6.7% in 1953, to 0.72 million or 6.8% in 1963, to 0.91 million or7.2% in 1971, to 1.12 million or 7.6% in 1981, to 1.43 million or 8.5% in2001, to 1.97 million or 9.7% in 2012.

Thus, assuming that the percentage of Muslims will continue toincrease by a half of a percentage point per decade; then the Muslimpopulation is expected to reach 2.5 million or 11.5% by 2050 and 2.1million or 14.0% by 2100

Historical Muslim population dataset for Sri Lanka

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.