Based on evidence from 1.5 million highly localised neighbourhoods of 700 people each in urban and rural India, a paper finds Indian Muslims to be systematically disadvantaged, less likely to have public schools, clinics, sewerage, water supply and closed drains than in non-Muslim areas, a misallocation of government services that is comparable to the current situation of blacks in the United States.
By Kavitha Iyer
Mumbai: Indian Muslims live in the most segregated neighbourhoods—more than one in every four (26%) lives in a neighbourhood that is over 80% Muslim.
A 100% Muslim locality is 10% less likely to have piped water and 50% less likely to have a secondary school than a neighbourhood without Muslim residents.
A child growing up in a 100% Muslim neighbourhood can expect to obtain two fewer years of education than a child growing up in a 0% Muslim neighbourhood.
Amid a rising tide of calls by right-wing Hindu groups for genocide or expulsion of Muslims (here, here), on the back of pledges for an economic boycott of Muslim businesses (here, here), newly compiled and analysed data show that not only do Indian Muslims live in sharply segregated neighbourhoods with significantly poorer access to government services, but they also endure poorer levels of education.
Viewed at the neighbourhood or locality-level, disaggregated from larger administrative units of city or district, Muslim neighbourhoods, along with neighbourhoods of scheduled caste (SC) homes, have comparatively lower numbers of schools, medical clinics, poorer water/sewerage infrastructure and electricity, the study said.
Suggesting that disparities in access to public services are a significant factor contributing to disadvantages that Muslims and SCs experience, the working paper based on evidence from 1.5 million neighbourhoods in urban and rural India, a granular look through a pan-India dataset of neighbourhoods with 700 people each, has found Indian Muslims to be systematically segregated and disadvantaged, in a manner comparable to the current situation of blacks in the United States (US).
The study contended further that these disparities account for about half of the urban educational disadvantage of Muslim and SC children in India.
The paper, ‘Residential Segregation and Unequal Access to Local Public Services in India’, by Sam Asher (Imperial College, London), Kritarth Jha (Development Data Lab), Anjali Adukia (University of Chicago), Paul Novosad (Dartmouth College) and Brandon Tan (International Monetary Fund), is based on data from 2011 to 2013, though it says the neighbourhood patterns it describes are likely to be persistent, having emerged over decades of migration and policy.
“The inequality in public service provision was more systematic than we anticipated,” said Novosad, professor of economics at Dartmouth College and co-founder of the Development Data Lab, which uses econometric and machine learning tools to generate policy-relevant insights. “You can see it in virtually every public service we measured, for both Muslim and SC neighbourhoods.”
Segregation is one of the most important contributors to persistent racial inequality in the United States, he said, where Black Americans have remained marginalised even 150 years after the end of slavery. “In India, we know that cities are segregated, but there have been too few data collection exercises that allow it to be described at the city and neighbourhood level, and almost none before our study that could map public services to neighbourhoods.”
Studies on the impact of segregation offer insights for policy. In the US and in South Africa, residential segregation was found to be at the centre of restricted socio-economic opportunities and mobility for marginalised groups, also affecting housing conditions, education and employment opportunities and, thereby, people’s ability to improve their economic status.
In India, voluntary and involuntary segregation has traditionally limited interaction between SCs and other Hindu caste groups and similarly between Muslims and Hindus, a reality not altered by the process of urbanisation. Earlier studies have shown (here, here) that Indian cities are characterised by a high degree of inequality in the availability of services like piped water and sewage, with Dalits and Adivasis facing the brunt of the deficit.
In a 2015 paper, economist Sukhadeo Thorat found that rental housing is commonly denied to Dalits and Muslims, with Muslims experiencing greater discrimination.
The 2023 working paper concluded that while the scheduled castes (SCs) also live in segregated colonies, they are a little more integrated in comparison—17% of urban SCs live in neighbourhoods with a minimum of 80% SC households.
“Indians of all social classes are very comfortable with segregation and the belief that social groups are better off if they keep to themselves — too comfortable,” Novosad told Article 14, calling it a universal human tendency to resist integration.
The US experience with segregated housing and inequality left “a poisonous legacy” for which Americans are still paying the price, he said, responding to why it was important for Indian cities to be recast as well-integrated urban spaces. “There is this persistent myth that you can help one group by keeping another group down, but it just sows social conflict, which is worse for everyone.”
Every Government Service Worse In These Localities
Holding that government-supplied public services were less likely to be found in neighbourhoods with high numbers of Muslims or SCs, the study found this to be true for nearly every service researchers could measure, including secondary schools, clinics and hospitals, electricity, water and sewerage.
The differences in service access were statistically significant and substantial, the report found.
“Private providers are not making up for the reduced service access of marginalised groups,” the study said. “In fact, private services also systematically locate away from marginalised group neighbourhoods, in part because these neighbourhoods are poorer.”
So, while a 100% Muslim locality is 10% less likely to have piped water infrastructure and 50% less likely to have a secondary school as compared to a non-Muslim neighbourhood, for government-run schools and clinics, the disadvantage in Muslim neighbourhoods is double the disadvantage in SC neighbourhoods.
For electricity, water and drainage, it is Dalits, who on average suffer poorer access or neighbourhood-level disadvantages.
Neighbourhoods with more than 50% Muslims stood out for being particularly underprovisioned in terms of public schools. This was true for rural locations too.
For household infrastructure services (access to electricity, closed drainage and clean water supply), services measured only in urban areas, all three services were systematically less available in both Muslim and SC neighbourhoods, with the latter being the most poorly served.
“In short, the urban political economy equilibrium systematically results in marginalised groups living in neighbourhoods that are less well-served by public facilities,” the study said.
Disparities Among Neighbourhoods Within Cities, Districts
Disparities at the neighbourhood level were more pronounced than at the district level. The study found districts and sub-districts with large SC populations to have more public facilities on average, but at the level of SC-dominated neighbourhoods within such a sub-district, nearly all of these advantages are eliminated.
The study considered allocation of public services at the neighbourhood-level, disaggregated from the district and city levels. While policy design, budgetary allocations, expenditure and execution are focused on the district or larger administrative units, the study looked at whether policies and plans have equal impacts across various neighbourhoods within a district.
This was important because more aggregated data may not show unequal service allocation even though central and state funds and schemes may be spread unequally among neighbourhoods within a city. “This creates a potential blind spot for policy makers,” the study said, adding that neighbourhood-level misallocations may go unchecked or unobserved…
This story was originally published in article-14.com. Read the full story here