Lagatar24 Desk
Washington, April 11: Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that India has the second-largest Muslim population in the world, and those who blame the nation for minority difficulties are ignorant of the situation on the ground.
At a fireside talk on Monday at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, DC, Sitharaman said the Muslim population in India is only expanding.
“If there is a perception or if there’s, in reality, their lives are difficult or made difficult with the support of the State, which is what is implied in most of these write-ups, I would ask, will the Muslim population be growing from what it was in 1947… The contrast can be sharper as opposed to Pakistan, which was formed at the same time,” she said.
Sitharaman claimed that while every aspect of the Muslim community is active in India, violence is prevalent against Muhajirs, Shias, and other minority groups in Pakistan.
“India was divided into two Pakistans. Pakistan declared itself an Islamic country but said minorities will be protected. Every minority has been dwindling in number, or decimated in Pakistan. Even some of the Muslim sects have also been decimated,” she added.
She stated that in India, maintaining law and order is the responsibility of the states and that each province has an elected administration in charge of doing so. She asserted that it is false to assume that violence against Muslims is occurring in India.
“It cannot be so. Each province and its police are different. They are run by the elected governments in those provinces. So, that itself tells you how these reports have no clue of the law and order systems in India,” she said.
“To say it’s all the blame of the government of India. I would like to say then, between 2014 and today, has the population dwindled, has the debts been disproportionately high in any one particular community,” she further added.
“I would rather invite these people who write these reports to come to India. I’ll host them, let them come and travel alone to India and prove their point,” Sitharaman said.
Notably, with more than one billion Muslims, the Asia-Pacific area (from Turkey to Indonesia) is home to over 62% of the world’s Muslims. At 12.7% of the global Muslim population, Indonesia has the biggest Muslim population of any nation.
