The population control policy implemented by the Indian government in recent decades has primarily affected the Muslim population.
According to Reuters, the population census is conducted every 10 years in India, with the last one carried out in 2011. According to the census, Muslims are the second largest religious community in India, constituting 14.2% of the 1.2 billion Indian population. Hindus are found to represent 79.8%.
The trend of shrinking Muslim families in India over the past 15 years has been remarkable. The National Survey of Family Health shows that the Muslim fertility rate – the average number of children a woman has – fell from 2.6 in 2015 to 2.4 in 2019.
The data also shows that the Muslim fertility rate is rapidly decreasing from 2.4 to 1.94, which is the current fertility rate for Hindus.
However, some local sources and experts informed about Indian Muslim issues have questioned the authenticity of such decline in the Muslim population.
