Represented Religious Minorities in Indian Prisons

The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) released its report titled as - Prison Statistics in India 2021.

Findings of the Report related to Minority Communities

As per the religion-wise breakup available for 5.22 lakh of the total 5.54 lakh prisoners across India (as Maharashtra did not submit the breakup for undertrials and detenues to NCRB), over 3.84 lakh were Hindus, 97,650 Muslims, 22,100 Sikhs, 13,118 Christians and 4,785 from other faiths.

• Muslims: The share of Muslims in India’s total prison population – comprising convicts, undertrials, detenues and others -- declined to 18.7% in 2021 from 20.2% in 2020.
• Sikhs: The percentage of Sikhs in the country’s prison population increased to 4.2% from 3.4% at the end of 2021. There has been a rather sharp rise in the number of Sikh prisoners, from 15,807 on December 31, 2020 to 22,100 on December 31, 2021
• Christians: The percentage of Christians fell marginally to 2.5% from 2.6% in the relevant timeframe.
• Overall, the total number of inmates in prisons has increased by 28% from 4.33 lakh to 5.54 lakh between 2016 and 2021.

Of the 5.54 lakh persons lodged in prisons across the country on December 31, 2021, 4.27 lakh were undertrials, 1.22 lakh convicts, 3,470 detenues and 547 ‘others’.