Although the proportion of these three communities in India adds up to about just 39% of the population, their share amongst prisoners is considerably higher at 53%.
India had 0.42 million people in prison in 2013. Nearly 20% of them were Muslims although the share of Muslims in India's population is about 13% according to Census 2001.
Religion-wise data from Census 2011 is yet to be released, but it is unlikely to be much different.
Dalits make up 22% of prisoners, almost one in four.
Their proportion in population is about 17% according to Census 2011. While adivasis make up 11% of prisoners, their share in the general population is 9%.
Most experts say that this disturbing trend is not because these communities commit more crimes. Rather, it arises because they are economically and socially under-privileged, unable to fight costly cases or often even pay for bail. Some say that these communities are targeted with false cases.
Former chief justice of Delhi high court Rajinder Sachar, who headed the committee that brought out a report on the condition of Muslim community in India in 2006, pointed out that there had been several cases where Muslim youths being acquitted after years in prison.
"Poverty is more prevalent among these three communities and that becomes an obstacle in dealing with the legal system," said Colin Gonsalves, human rights activist and lawyer.
"Our system has an ingrained communal and casteist bias. Also, the proportion of these communities in the police officers and even judiciary is less. These are key factors behind this shocking imbalance," he added.
Pointing out that nearly 68% of the prisoners are under-trials, Abusaleh Sharif, who was member-secretary of the Sachar Committee and later brought out an updated report on the conditions of Muslims, said that they had to remain behind bars because of inability to negotiate the hostile system.
"Among those in prison under preventive detention laws, nearly half are Muslims. This is the kind of thing that the government needs to speedily investigate and resolve," Sharif said.
Ramesh Nathan of the National Dalit Movement for Justice alleged that false cases are filed against dalits in order to intimidate them, causing this disturbingly high number of prisoners among vulnerable sections.
"In my experience as a lawyer, whenever a dalit person files a case under the Atrocities Act, a false countercase under some penal code provision is filed by the culprits," he said.
COMMENTS (13)
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Report didn't say about Christians,Sikhs and Buddhists and Hindus . When all the terrorists in the world are muslims , so they have to populate jail. Jail is meant for criminals , not for innocents . You go to UK,Germany and see the number of muslims in prison and compare them with their population ratio , then you will understand the reason . Saudi is executing Pakistanis on regular basis , they are not non-muslims either . You go to Guantamo and come out with muslim prison inmate ratio . They are a proud community , you know .
You are forgetting the fact that the right place for the criminal minded people are prison.
@AB:
Well the report criticizes everyone but Muslims. So, who is self righteous here?
even in UK Muslims are disproportionately represented in prison populations. Dont blame India.
Why should prison population have to reflect the demographics of the county? It is ridiculous to suggest that it should. Just see the black population in US prisons. It is about 50%, while the overall black population is mere 14%.
Muslims are always in higher numbers in prison compared to their population in many countries. Hindus are much less in number in prisons in saudi. So what conclusions one draws. Nothing, Zilch. What a pathetic article. Pl for heavens sake, we have enough of religion in every other aspects. Dont add more. Nobody commits crime after checking with the statistics and in proportion to their numbers in population.
Muslims are disproportionately represented in prisons in all countries wrt %population. Check UK or EU records. Nothing new in this. muslim majority areas in Indian cities are more crime prone as well. Look at Pakistan,, its more of a criminal enterprise than a country
Do you knpw, why they are in prisons , because they commited crime, under Indian Penal Code, not because of caste, culture or religion. Let's not even discuss Pakistan's laws or judiciary. The world is well aware of your laws in regards to your minorities.
Oh Stop - please do not criticize our "self-righteous" neighbour.
Muslim population in india is more than 15%
So 20% in jail is very much balanced numbers
If you do the crime, you do the time.
One of the main reason for the large number of SC/ST/Tribals/Muslims in prison is poverty. if you got money, you can arrange for lawyers, bail and fight your case in Courts and even pay fine or find guarantee person to pay the bail amount. Unfortunately, these sections of society are too poor to arrange them, so they linger on Jails. Many an effort are also undertaken by govt. to somehow provide legal assistance to underprivileged/poor but they are still inadequate.
So rest 47 % are hindus. While rest community only 20% 30% behind bars isn't it bias towards hindus then? No human rights defender for them? It's always false charge when one represents a client. Only during elections do such reports come out by sonia media sevaks in media and neighbour country pick on it. We know our politicians and vote bank sysmpathy politics well. A criminal is a criminal be any religion. If there is proof he should behind bars. If innocence is proven they should be let off. Even in UK,USA people of one race are found most behind bars. Because poverty makes you do wrong things. They don't arrest you out of bias purposely. The problem with indian judicial system is we have excellent laws. But we're are so less courts for 1.25 billion people. It takes painful thirty years for case to start or end a case. By the time for serious non bailable offence, if he's innocent suffer in jail till his case starts. Even if the offence is bailable, rich can come out. Poor can never afford bail. But that's universal in india. Don't negate the rest 47% hindus for congressi type communal politics of divide and rule. We need to have more courts. A court per 500 and fast track courts like for terrorism and other crimes we have in the country.