In 10 yrs, Muslim count up by 17.74 lakh, Hindu population by 5.61 lakh in J&K

Sumit Hakhoo

Tribune News Service

Jammu, August 26

The Muslim population in Jammu and Kashmir has increased by 17.74 lakh in the past one decade, while the number of Hindus has grown by 5.61 lakh.

As per the religious population data of Census 2011, released by the Central government, there was addition of 23.35 lakh souls since 2001 taking the population to 1.25 crore in the Himalayan state.

The total population of Muslims in J&K is 85,67,485, while there are 35,66,674 Hindus. Among the religious communities, the Buddhist population, which stood at 1,137,87 as per 2001 Census, has declined by 1.2 per cent in the past one decade. According to the 2011 Census, there are 1,12,584 Buddhists in J&K.

The Sikh population, which was 2,071,54 in 2001, has increased to 2,34,848, addition of 27, 694 souls, while the Christian population has increased by 15,332. In 2001, there were 20,299 Christians, while in 2011 there are 35,631.

As many as 91.08 lakh people live in rural areas while 34.33 lakh live in urban areas of the state, especially in capital cities of Jammu and Srinagar, which has seen rapid expansion of the area due to influx of people.

J&K has 22 districts, 82 sub-districts, 122 towns and 6,551 villages.

Srinagar has 12.36 lakh population with 12,36,829 Muslims and surprisingly 42,540 Hindus live in the summer capital despite the fact that almost all Kashmiri Hindu population had left the Valley in 1990.

In Jammu, of the total population 15,29,958, there are 12,89,240 Hindus, while the number of Muslims is 1,07,489.

In the Ladakh region, the total population is 1,33,487. Hindus are the second largest religious group after Buddhists. As many as 88,635 are Buddhists, 22,882 Hindus and 19,057 are Muslims. In Kargil, there are 1,08,039 Muslims, 20,126 Buddhists and 10,341 Hindus. The total population of Kargil is 1,40,802.

Comparing with other states of the country on vital statistics, J&K is least literate among northern states.

Though the state’s literate population has been pegged at more than 68 per cent of the total population, it is far behind other northern states like Himachal Pradesh (83.78 per cent), Punjab (76.68 per cent) and Haryana (76.64 per cent). Jammu and Kashmir’s literate population was recorded at 55.5 per cent in the 2001 census.

According to the 2011 census, the state has over 72.45 lakh literate persons, including 43.7 lakh males and 28.74 lakh females.