Untouched by India's Growing Prosperity
—Michael Medved

In India, a report to the prime minister's office indicates that Muslims, the nation's largest religious minority, have fallen far behind the rest of the country. Representing 13 percent of the national population, the Islamic community has remained largely untouched by the recent surge in Indian living standards and remains disproportionately uneducated, impoverished, dysfunctional, prone to criminal violence and imprisoned.

While some Indian politicians blame the government and demand a massive new system of quotas and affirmative action, shouldn't they consider the potential that the problem stems in part from Muslim culture and values? After all, Islamic nations around the world suffer from similar difficulties: a propensity to violence, shoddy education and rejection of modernity.

The fact that the nation's 160 million Muslim citizens haven't benefited fully from India's miraculous economic progress of recent years merely re-enforces the idea that not all values systems and cultures will produce the same results.