Chhattisgarh And Odisha See A Significant Jump In Christian Population

Centre for Policy Studies (CPS) has posted their twenty-second note on the Religion Data of Census 2011 on their website and it lists pockets of high Christian presence.

The bottomline is, out of India’s 2.78 crore Christians (2011 Census), 25.80 lakhs live in Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh. In these three States, they are concentrated in a few districts forming three distinct pockets. These are:

#1 Ranchi-Sundargarh-Raigarh Pocket

#2 Gajapati-Kandhamal Pocket

#3 Santhal Pargana Pocket

Here’s a brief summary of Christian presence and their growth in these three pockets:

Ranchi-Sundargarh-Raigarh Pocket

• There are three distinct pockets of high Christian presence in Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh. The first, the largest and historically the oldest of these comprises contiguous parts of the earlier undivided Ranchi district of Jharkhand, Sundargarh of Odisha and undivided Raigarh district of Chhattisgarh.
• There are 14.8 lakh Christians in this compact pocket and they form 14.8 percent of the population here.
• Raigarh has been nearly stable since 1971. But in Ranchi, Christian share had increased from 10.6 percent in 1901 to 18.6 percent in 1951 and in Raigarh it had suddenly spurted form less than 2 percent in 1951 to more than 10 percent in 1971.
• In Sundargarh, the share of Christians had risen from less than 10 percent in 1921 to nearly 16.6 percent in 1971. This was followed by three decades of slow growth but there has been a sudden spurt in their share during the last decade.
• Though the growth of Christianity has slowed down in parts of this pocket, especially in Ranchi, yet a further rise in Christian influence is being achieved by carving out smaller regions of high Christian presence as separate districts and sub-districts.
• During 2001-11, two new districts, Simdega and Khunti, have been created within the earlier undivided Ranchi district. The share of Christians in Simdega now is 51.1 percent, making it the only Christian-majority district in India outside the northeast. The share of Christians in Khunti at 25.6 percent is the second highest in Jharkhand.
• Though the share of Christians in undivided Ranchi has somewhat declined during 2001-11, it has risen by more than two percentage points in these two new districts.
• In Chhattisgarh, the Christian dominated parts of Raigarh have been carved out as the separate Jashpur district during 1991-2001. The share of Christians there is 22.3 percent. The growth of Christianity in this part also seems to have slowed down; during 2001-11, there has been some decline in the share of Christians in Jashpur.
• In Sundargarh, however, the share of Christians has increased from 16.8 to 18.4 percent during 2001-11. This rise is a reflection of the robust spread of Christianity in different parts of Odisha during the last two or three decades.
• There has been some spread of Christianity from the Ranchi-Sundargarh-Raigarh pocket to the neighbouring districts of Latehar and Garhwa in Jharkhand, Surguja in Chhattisgarh and undivided Sambalpur and its component districts in Odisha.

Gajapati-Kandhamal Pocket

• Gajapati and Kandhamal districts comprise the second pocket of high Christian presence in this region. This pocket has developed as a consequence of the very rapid rise of Christianity in these districts in the recent past, mostly after 1981.
• Both Gajapati and Kandhamal have been carved out of larger districts of Ganjam and Baudh-Kandhamal, respectively. The Christian presence in the larger districts was not very significant.
• The share of Christians in the parts that now form Gajapati district has risen from 11.8 percent in 1971 to 38 percent in 2011; in Kandhamal, it has increased from 9.4 percent in 1981 to 20.3 percent in 2011.
• There is a similarly rapid rise in the share of Christians in the adjoining districts of Rayagada, Nabarangapura and Koraput; especially in Rayagada, where the share of Christians has risen from 1.6 percent in 1971 to 8.8 percent in 2011.
• The rise of Christianity in this part of Odisha thus seems very rapid.

Santhal Pargana Pocket

• There also has been a very rapid rise of Christianity in a pocket formed by Godda, Sahibganj, Pakur and Dumka components of Santhal Pargana. The share of Christians in these four districts together has risen from 2.03 percent in 1971 to 6.05 percent now. The share has increased from 4.60 to 6.05 percent during the last decade alone, indicating that the process of rise of Christianity in this pocket is becoming stronger.
  

Apart from these pockets, there are several sub-districts where Christians form a majority; and some of them are becoming exclusively Christian, with their share touching 80 percent and above in at least two of them and near or above 60 percent in another six.

Read the full note here.