Divorce Rates – Census 2011

Today noted Bollywood lyricist Javed Akhtar in a tweet claimed that as per Census 2011, the divorce rate amongst Hindus was 0.76% and that of Muslims was only 0.53%

A little search on Google reveals that the All India Muslim Personal Law Board is also making similar claims about divorce rates being lower than Hindus, especially in the context of the Triple Talaq matter being heard in the Supreme Court.

The National Herald website ( 🙂 ) is also doing its bit to peddle this claim further. It says divorce rates amongst Hindus is 0.76% while the same for Muslims is 0.56%

Secular newspapers such as Times Of India and the Hindu have also added their bit to this issue.

Now, let us look at the reality.

Source: Census 2011 – C-3 Marital Status By Religious Community And Sex – 2011

Table 1: Data for Total Population

Table 2: Data for Hindus

Table 3: Data for Muslims

Observations:

• The percentage of divorced amongst Hindus is 0.18 while it is 0.33 for Muslims
• Percentage of divorced + separated amongst Hindus is 0.73 while it is 0.81 for Muslims
• The divorced and separated percentages are extremely high for Muslim women, with the latter crossing the 1 percentage mark.

Conclusions:

• Main stream media, once again, has picked up random numbers and stitched together a narrative.
• Some of the other numbers quoted in the above referenced articles are all based on random surveys done in a few select districts.
• The problem of divorce is much more amongst Muslims that Hindus. It is especially so amongst Muslim women.