Data | Eighteenth Lok Sabha has lowest share of Muslim MPs in six decades

Only ten States/UTs have at least one Muslim MP, that too with steep declines of share in many

Senior leaders Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge attend a meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Party comprising all newly elected Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs in Central Hall of Parliament in New Delhi | Photo Credit: Reuters

The eighteenth Lok Sabha has the lowest share of Muslim MPs in six decades. Less than 5% of its members currently are Muslims despite people from the community forming over 15% of the country’s population. In total, there are currently 24 Muslim MPs (4.4%) in the Lok Sabha. Notably, the record low occurred despite a considerable spike in the share of Muslim MPs from the Indian National Congress, the second-biggest party in the current Lok Sabha. 

The party with the most members in 2024, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has no representatives from the Muslim community currently. In fact, the decline in the share of the Muslim MPs in the Lok Sabha, in the 1990s, coincided with the rise of the BJP, whose total MP tally crossed the 100 mark for the first time in the 10th Lok Sabha (1991-96).

Chart 1 | The chart shows the share of the Muslim MPs in India from the third to the eighteenth Lok Sabha. Figures in %

Charts appear incomplete? Click to remove AMP mode

Before the slump in the 1990s, the share of Muslims in the Lok Sabha peaked at 8.3% in the 1980s — 7th (1980-84) and 8th (1984-89) Lok Sabhas, when Congress was in power. Post the slump in the 1990s, the share again incrementally increased and grew close to 7% in the 14th Lok Sabha (UPA 1: 2004-09), coinciding with the dip in the BJP’s MP count in the 2000s. In the latest four Lok Sabhas (UPA 2: 4.8%, NDA 1: 4.7%, NDA 2: 5%, NDA 3: 4.4%), the share of Muslim MPs declined to 5% or less similar to the proportion recorded in the 1990s.

Chart 2 | The chart shows the share of the Muslim MPs in the BJP and the Congress from the third to the eighteenth Lok Sabha. Figures in %.

Currently, with seven Muslim MPs, the Congress is on the top of the party-wise list, which translates to 7% of the total Congress MPs. This is the first time since the eighth Lok Sabha (1984-89), thatthe share of Muslim MPs in the Congress crossed the 7% mark. The share peaked at around 7.5% in the 6th, 7th and 8th Lok Sabhas (1977-89). Since then, the share had sharply and consistently declined to reach 1.1% in the seventeenth Lok Sabha (2019-2024) as shown in Chart 2, only to increase again in the latest term.  

Chart 3 | The chart shows the number of the Muslim MPs in each party in the current Lok Sabha.

Followed by the Congress, the All India Trinamool Congress and the Samajwadi Party are the other parties on the top of the list with five and four Muslim MPs respectively. Elevenpercent of SP’s MPs are Muslims and 17% of AITC’s MPs are Muslims. The other Muslim MPs are from Indian Union Muslim League (3), Jammu & Kashmir National Congress (2), All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (1) and two independents. 

Click to subscribe to our Data newsletter

The record low share in the latest Lok Sabha was mostly due to steep declines in the share of Muslim MPs in Assam and Kerala. In Assam, the share declined from 14% to 7%. In Kerala, it reduced from 19% to 15%. Even in Uttar Pradesh, despite the INDIA alliance winning a majority of seats in 2024, the State recorded a slight decline in the share of Muslim MPs from 8% in the previous Lok Sabha to 6% in 2024. 

Chart 4 | The chart shows the State-wise proportion of the Muslim MPs over time.

Union Territories with just one MP were not considered. States with no record of Muslim MPs ever have been excluded from the chart. All in all, only ten States and UTs have at least one Muslim MP in the Lok Sabha in the current term. 

States such as Arunachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Sikkim and Uttarakhand have never elected a Muslim MP, according to the methodology followed in this article.

Methodology: To identify Muslim MPs, character-based machine learning models developed by Rachana and Sugat Chaturvedi in their 2023 paper “It’s all in the name: A character-based approach to infer religion” was implemented. Their Support Vector Machine algorithm was applied to the names of MPs to predict their religion. This was followed by manual checks to correct false positives and false negatives

vignesh.r@thehindu.co.in, nitika.evangeline@thehindu.co.in

Source: Election Commission of India and Lok Dhaba

Listen to our Data podcast:Awareness or affordability: Why are cervical cancer screening levels low among Indian women?