When I was a schoolboy I used to travel from Pune (then Poona) to Bangalore by train. Overnight I would see that the countryside was pitch black save for odd bonfires which I thought might be campers. It was years later, in medical college I studied some facts about India that shocked me. All those "campers" represented 80% of the Indian population in rural areas (then 750 million). I was also shocked to learn that 80% of the tonnage of all goods transported by India in those days had at least one leg that was being done by bullock cart. It was easier to improve the bullock cart than replace it. One more thing I learned is that none of these figures is static. They are changing and evolving every day, but are measured only once in a few years. The exact frequency of measurement is less important that realizing that the nation is not a static statistic. The India of 1990 was not the India of 1975 and the Indian of 2005 is not the India of 1990. Only the name is static, unless we decide to change that.
I have picked up the following figures from Wiki. I will indicate other sources as needed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_India
Population: 1,166,079,217 (2009 est)
Birth rate: 22.22 births/1,000 population (2009 est)
Death rate: 6.4 deaths/1,000 population (2009 est)
We have 22 people being born per 1000, and only 6 people dying. So for every 1000 people we have a net increase of 16 people per year.
Rural Population: 72.2%,
750 million Indian live in villages. India is a country made up of predominantly of villagers. We have more people living in villages than the entire population of any other country except China
But hey - we have 400 million urbanites. Even our urban population is higher than the entire population of any other country in the world save China.
(SeeLink: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... population)
Percent of the population under the poverty line: 22% (2006 est.). 250 milllion Indian live below the poverty line. Only the US and China have a population more than 250 million. Lesson: India has more people under the poverty line than the total population of any other country save the US and China
The religion break up of India is as follows:
- Hindus 80.46%
Muslims 13.43%
Christians 2.3%
Sikhs 1.9%
Buddhists 0.8%
Jains 0.4%
Other Religions & Persuasions 0.6%
Religion not stated 0.1%
Total fertility rate
2.72 children born/woman (2009 est.) The TFR (Total number of children born per women) according to Religion in 2001 was :
Hindus — 2.0 Muslims — 2.4 Sikhs — 1.6 Christians — 2.1 Buddhists — 2.1 Jains — 1.4 Animists and Others — 2.99 Tribals — 3.16 Scheduled Castes — 2.89
India has 160 million scheduled castes and about 80 million scheduled tribes.
The fastest reproducers are the STs, followed by the SCs and then Muslims.
Over 300 million Indian are under 14 years of age. They all need to be educated. By the time we celebrate another decade of BR we will have 150 million yahoos more in India unless we can educate and employ these people.
Here is a list of languages:
1 Hindi dialects 41.03%
2 Bengali 8.11%
3 Telugu 7.37%
4 Marathi 6.99%
5 Tamil 5.91%
6 Urdu 5.01%
7 Gujarati 4.48%
8 Kannada 3.69%
9 Malayalam 3.21%
10 Oriya 3.21%
11 Punjabi 2.83%
12 Assamese 1.28%
13 Maithili 1.18%
15 Bhili/Bhilodi 0.95%
14 Santali 0.63%
15 Kashmiri 0.54%
16 Nepali 0.28%
17 Gondi 0.27%
18 Sindhi 0.25%
19 Konkani 0.24%
20 Dogri 0.22%
21 Khandeshi 0.21%
22 Kurukh 0.17%
23 Tulu 0.17%
24 Meitei (Manipuri) 0.14%
25 Bodo 0.13%
26 Khasi 0.112%
27 Mundari 0.105%
28 Ho 0.103%
29 Sanskrit 0.001%
Here is a graph of how India has arrested its population growth
more later...