New Delhi, Feb. 18: The Sachar Committee report on the Muslim community has nailed the lie on the issue of Muslim reproduction and the "prevailing Muslim conspiracy" to reduce Hindus to minority status. The report, quoting extensively from Census reports and the National Health Survey, highlights how the last decade has witnessed a sharp decline in Muslim fertility rates as against the rest of the population.

Estimates show that the total fertility rate (TFR) among Muslims declined from about 4.3 to 3.6 in the 1990s, a reduction of about 0.9 points. During the same period fertility rates for the population as a whole declined from about 3.4 to 2.9, a reduction of nearly 0.5 points. The decline in fertility among Muslims was, therefore, sharper than average.

Dr Rakesh Basak, an economist with IIM Ahmedabad and a member of the committee, points out that at present "there is (only) a 0.7-point difference between the Muslim and the average fertility rates. While the average fertility rate is 2.9, for Muslims it is 3.6." Dr Basak emphasises that 37 per cent of Muslims use contraceptives against a national average of 48 per cent. Therefore, contraceptive usage is about 10 percentage points lower among Muslims than the average.

However, there are significant regional variations. The use of contraceptives amongst Muslims is more widespread in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh than amongst Hindus in these States. In Gujarat, there is hardly any difference in the use of contraceptives across religious communities. In general, the report observes, contraceptive usage goes up with education and development and all communities benefit from such changes. Of course, the availability of various contraceptive options also plays a major role in enhancing contraceptive use.

Dr Basak says, "Data shows that on an average Muslims prefer using reversible methods of family planning as compared to nasbandi (sterilisation). This is true of several Hindu communities as well." He adds, "If there are severe supply-side constraints in the availability of the preferred contraceptive options, adoption may suffer. There is evidence to suggest that the unmet needs of the Muslim population for reversible methods of family planning are high."

In fact, fertility rates among Muslims in some regions are quite low, close to replacement levels, while they are high for the Hindus (much higher than the replacement levels) in some other regions. Populations in different regions are going through different phases of demographic transition. Like other population groups, Muslims are also going through demographic transition in each of these regions, except that they are doing so with a time gap.

On an average, there is a lag of about 10 to 15 years. Estimates suggest that Muslim fertility rates for the country as a whole would reach replacement levels by the turn of the century while the non-Muslim population might do so about 15 years earlier. On the basis of these estimates, one can say that the share of the Muslim population in the total population would stabilise at around 18 per cent to 20 per cent by the turn of the century.

"Insofar as changes in fertility rates are affected by levels of education (especially among women), levels of income and availability of decent health infrastructure, these changes may occur earlier if conditions of Muslims on these counts improve rapidly," Dr Basak adds. The other fascinating aspect of this study is that it highlights how infant and child mortality rates among Muslims are lower than that among SC/STs and several Hindu groups while it is higher than the mortality rates prevalent among Christians and Sikhs.

One of the key members of the group attributed it to the Muslims� practice of eating non-vegetarian food. Dr Basak does not agree with this interpretation. He says, "Muslims are not the only non-vegetarians. SC/STs and OBCs also eat meat. It has something to do with intra-household distribution of food when kids are being fed. My conjecture is that there is less bias against girls in Muslim households, which helps the mother and also ensures that the birth weights of daughters are much better."

"If I were to hazard a guess, I would say it has something to do with child-rearing practices. There is likely to be lower gender bias in the distribution of food within Muslim households, which may result in somewhat better health conditions of women during and in post-pregnancy periods. In the same vein, the female child may also get a fairer share of food at home. While this hypothesis requires closer scrutiny, two facts are consistent with this argument. One, the sex ratios at different age groups are better among Muslims and the incidence of low birth-weight babies remains among the lowest," he says.

Members of the committee pointed out that it was difficult to ascertain the reasons for this because most of the factors that reduce mortality rates were not in favour of the Muslim community. Poverty levels were higher and education levels lower among Muslims than among non-SC/ST Hindus; access to good child delivery and other health services are also relatively poor among the community and the Muslim children are at a slightly higher risk of being nutritionally deprived than other Hindus. The report did not come up with any explanations, it only highlighted these apparently contradictory patterns.

The other interesting detail highlighted in the report is the large variation in fertility rates across different states. Fertility rates among Muslims in states like Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Jammu and Kashmir and Andhra Pradesh are much lower than the fertility rates in some the northern parts of the country for virtually all socio-religious communities. Dr Basak emphasises that there are no separate "Muslim and Hindu fertility rates". Populations in different regions are going through different phases of the demographic transition, he says.