Study by Maharashtra government shows muslims' welfare in poor light

The condition of Muslims in the state with respect to their education, employment and social life continues to remain abysmal. The same had come out through the efforts of an NGO, Movement for Peace and Justice (MPJ) which managed to procure the finding of the state government-appointed committee formed under Mehmood Ur Rehman, to study condition of muslims in the state.

Constituting 10.6% of the total population, the task assigned to the committee was to look at the backwardness in the community on educational, social and employment fronts. Though formed in 2008, the committee took around five years to complete its report. It was, however, gathering dust as the state had neither tabled it in the assembly or discussed about it.

In a press conference in which the details of the study were given out, 60% of the population continues to live below the poverty line. There was a high level of insecurity among the community members and the level of employment was low.

"Only 32.4% of the population is employed. Of this figure, only four per cent has proper jobs. The rest is in the unorganised sector that makes their survival all the more difficult," said Mohammed Siraj, president of the MPJ.

Besides not being employed, the report stated that the community did not even have the basic facilities of healthcare which added to their plight. "Most of the places in the muslim locality do not have good healthcare facilities," said Afsar Usmani, general secretary of the MPJ. Due to this, the speakers said that the child mortality rate was higher in the community. As compared to the average of 22 deaths per 1,000 births in the country, the community had 28 deaths.

The report also stated that there should be more education. The fact that only 2.2% graduated, spoke of the low level of high education, which was followed by almost no one qualifying to be an IAS officer in the state. When it comes to ownership of property, there was little that the community had. Only 10% seemed to have any kind of land holding.

"Those who are poor do not even have BPL cards," said Siraj. The report also states that in prisons, 27% of the members belonged to the community.

"There is discrimination at all levels. We are not asking for any monetary benefits to be provided to the community. What we want is some action to be taken on the report," said Siraj. When contacted, Naseem Khan, minister of minorities affairs did not have any reason for the implementation of the report. "There is no point discussing the report. Action should be taken and a committee under chief secretary has been formed to take action on the same," said Khan to dna.