New Delhi: More than 280 million people or nearly 3.6 per cent of the world’s population are international migrants. A new study by the US-based Pew Research Center throws light on the religious composition of migrants across the world. They studied people from all religions, across countries and came up with certain interesting findings.
India top origin country of migrants
The study showed that India was the top country of origin for migrants in 2020. However as a destination for migrants it ranks at 14th position. Interestingly Turkey and war-torn Ukraine are ranked above India in this category. The number of migrants from India is far higher than the migrants living in India, showed the PEW study.
Around 80 per cent of the population of the country are Hindus and they form just 41 per cent of the emigrant population. This number is considerably high when we look at the Muslim population. Though they form 15 per cent of the population in India, they form 33 per cent of the population of people who were born in India but are now living elsewhere.
Just like Muslims, Christians also form a small miniscule part of the population in India, just 2 per cent, but the figure for emigrants from this category is 16 per cent. Hindus comprise only 5 per cent of the global migrant population, though their world population is 15 per cent globally.
Apart from India, other top countries for the origin of migrants are Nepal, Sri Lanka and China.
India preferred destination of Hindus
Not only is India the top country of origin of migrants but it is also the top destination of migrants. One must note that in 2020 more than 5 million Indian residents were born in some other country. This figure is less than the 1990 figure of 7.6 million such people. The reason for the fall is the aging and gradual death of the migrants who came to India from Pakistan, following partition.
Most migrants in India come from Bangladesh and Pakistan. While 2.6 million people living in India were born in Bangladesh, while 8,70,000 came from Pakistan. Other top countries from where people migrated to India are, Nepal, Sri Lanka and China. In fact between 1990 and 2020 the number of migrants from Nepal and China has increased.
Migrant population in India is less likely to be Hindu when compared to the general population. The figure of Hindu migrants in the country is 61 per cent, while it is 79 per cent for the resident Hindu population. But for Muslims this is different. Migrant Muslim population is 19 per cent in India, while those who are resident Muslims is 15 per cent.