The think tank said media outlets were misreporting the findings contained in the working paper “to spread alarm regarding the growth of the Muslim population”
The Population Foundation of India (PFI) on May 9 night expressed deep concerns about media reports misrepresenting the data set put out by the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM) in a recently published working paper on the share of religious minorities in 167 countries, including India.
The PFI, an independent think tank working on population trends and reproductive/sexual health, said that media outlets were misreporting the findings contained in the working paper “to spread alarm regarding the growth of the Muslim population”, adding, “Such interpretations are not only inaccurate but also misleading and baseless.”
In the working paper titled “Share of Religious Minorities: A Cross-Country Analysis (1950-2015)“ published on May 7, the EAC-PM examines the shares of majority and minority religious communities in the total populations of 167 countries, including India’s.
The paper strikingly claimed that for India, while the share in population of Muslims increased by 43.15% in this time period, the share in population of Hindus decreased by 7.82%, adding that in 1950, Hindus’ share in population was 84.68%, coming down to 78.06% in 2015. Similarly, Muslims’ share in population had risen from 9.84% to 14.09%.
This story was originally published in thehindu.com. Read the full story here.
