All governments and departments contacted came to the Committee’s assistance minus the Armed Forces which, after a big controversy about reserving places in the Army, refused to make its denominational details available. While sources maintain that they always knew of Muslim backwardness, what has come as a surprise is the fact of how consistently they lack representation in each and every field. In virtually all social and health indices, Muslims are way behind their Hindu and even Scheduled Castes and Tribes` counterparts, except in Infant Mortality Ratios and the Sex Ratio.

This is not the first time that the Indian government has embarked on an exercise to find out the state of its largest minority. In 1983, a similar high-level panel led by Gopal Singh, constituted by then-prime minister Indira Gandhi, submitted its report on how much all minorities, including Muslims, were in a position to take advantage of schemes and other governmental incentives, and also their status in government employment.

Though unlike the Sachar Report which has covered all districts, the Gopal Singh Report had been able to procure information for only 80 of the then 500 districts. But despite its limited regional coverage, the findings of that Report generate a sense of deja vu ; “it has been represented to us that the minorities are not getting their due share in the recruitment to Armed Forces”.

Speaking about the judiciary it says the “representation of minorities in the Judiciary is very low”. It goes onto say, “we recommend that wherever qualified candidates are available, every effort should be made to appoint them as judges of District Courts, High Courts and Supreme Court in adequate numbers”.