LONDON: In a sharp jump in just one year, Muhammad has emerged as the most common first name given to baby boys born in London in 2012. The name was also second most common among new born male babies across UK and Wales the same year–Harry being the most common second year in a row.

Interestingly in 2011, Daniel and Oliver were the top two names given to new born male children in London. Muhammad (spelt this way) was ranked third (658) in London with Mohammed (spelt like this) ranked as the eight commonest name in London given to 634 male children.

Across England and Wales, Harry and Amelia were the most popular first names given to babies maintaining the top spots from 2011.

In 2011, Mohammed (with this spelling) was ranked 19th most popular baby name while Muhammad (spelt this way) was ranked 22.

Over the total of 729,674 registered births in 2012 there were more than 28,000 different boys’ names and over 36,000 different girls’ names.

Interestingly three different spellings of the name Muhammad are listed in the top 100 names for boys.

The most common is Muhammad, which is in 19th place on the table. Mohammed comes 26th and Mohammad is in 60th place.

Overall the name was given 7,139 times in 2012, just 29 behind Harry–which took the top spot.

Despite this variation, those in each top 10 accounted for 13% of all given names.

Britain’s Office for National Statistics (ONS) released the most popular first names for babies born in England and Wales in 2012 on Monday. In particular, it examined the 100 most popular first names for boys and for girls and compared the ranks of those names with the ranks in 2011 and 2002.

Experts say Asian names have become very common in London specially because of the city’s swelling migrant population. Indians have become the largest foreign-born group in London. Nearly 9% of all foreign-born residents in London are now Indian.

In sheer numbers, this means 2.63 lakh persons born in India are now living in London.

London had about 3 million foreign-born residents in 2011 (37% of the total London population and 40% of the total foreign-born population of England and Wales).

London’s foreign-born population increased by 54% since 2001, accounting for 105% of the total population increase, as the UK-born population decreased in the decade.

Moreover, London concentrates a large proportion (40%) of the entire foreign-born population of England and Wales.

Between 2001 and 2011, the total resident population of England and Wales increased by 14%, by about 1 million residents.

However, the UK-born population in London actually declined, by 1% (about 50,000 residents). This means that the entire growth of the London population can be accounted for the by increase in the number of residents that had been born outside of the UK.

ONS had looked at the top five non-UK born mothers’ countries by number of births (Poland, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and Nigeria).

GFRs for the UK show that women born in Pakistan have the highest fertility rates of the five individual maternal countries of birth examined, with around 180 births per thousand women in 2011, compared with around 60 births per thousand for UK born women.

The impact of non-UK born women on fertility is largest in London.

This is due to a high proportion of the childbearing age population in London being non-UK born, and lower UK born fertility in London than the UK average. This could also explain the higher number of Mohammad’s being born.

