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Well, this is the third lecture on population of India. In the first lecture, I talked about
changes in size of population, changes in growth rates of population, and sex ratio.
And in the second lecture, I went to some aspects of composition of India’s population,
with focus on age distribution, distribution according to workers and non workers, marital
status and some related issues. We discussed at length the idea of age pyramids and what
do age pyramids indicate and how do changes in birth and death rates, form the shape of
age pyramid. Now, today we will talk about trends in death
and birth rates. That means we will focus on, what we call processes of population.
There are two aspects of populations composition and processes demographic, composition and
demographic processes. In demographic composition, may include composition and structure of population
according to age, sex, marital status, occupation industry, urban rural residence and so on.
About urban rural residence we will talk a little later and focus more on trends in urbanization
and implications of that. In processes we include fertility, mortality,
migration, social mobility and marriages. On marriage, I have already made some comment
in the last lecture and shown what is the average age of marriage in India, and that
it is increasing. And that there is a legal minimum of eighteen, our median is very close
to eighteen, but now eighteen, that means more than 50 percent marriages are still taking
place below the age of eighteen legal minimum. We will talk about migration a little later
and normally in India, demographers seldom talk about social mobility or occupational
mobility and issues related with social stratification. Demographers focus, more on fertility and
mortality some time we also talk about migration, but studies of fertility and mortality must
be occupying 90 percent of Indian demographic studies. That is because India’s population,
the process part is more affected by changes in death and birth rates. So, today we will
talk about death and birth rates and in the next lecture on monday in the next lecture,
we will be talking about migration and related issues. In related issues, we will particularly
focus on projections of populations and implications of them.
When we look at death and birth rate, we talk first about death rate because the decline
in death rate started first. This is what the demographic ties and theory said and this
is also a fact. Fact pertaining to world population, fact pertaining to population of developed
countries, developing countries and also effect pertaining to population of India. That death
rate starts declining first.
It must be understood, that rise and fall in the growth rate of India is the result
of systematic changes in death and birth rates from high levels to moderate levels. We have
not come to low levels yet. In the beginning of the last century, crude death rates and
birth rates of India were in the vicinity of 50 per thousand population, which was maximum?
The maximum birth rate normally observed in any country or in the vicinity of 50 per thousand
population. In terms of average number of children, this gets translated into a total
fertility rate of about 7, in India also it is believed that 6 to 7 was the fertility
rate. Death rate started declining in the first
decade itself, but in the second decade, due to influenza epidemic around 1918, death rate
for decayed 11 to 21 grows to a higher level and that is why population of India, experience
a negative growth rate. But otherwise on a long term basis, death rates started falling
in the first few decades of the last century. And by the year, 41 during 31 to these are
all tentative estimates, we did not have very good record keeping at that time. One can
say that during the decade 31 to 41, death rate in India had declined to 31, and that
was mostly due to control of infection diseases. After that due to socioeconomic development
and efforts made by the government of India, to provide health facilities to general population,
mortality rate started declining further. So, death rate reach the level of 31 around
31 by 1941 and it started declining further. The crude death rate of India, during 1971
to 81, which is more accurate. Now, we have few years from sample registration scheme,
which are more accurate figures, though not 100 percent accurate. The crude death rate
in 71 to 81 was 15. One, less than one third of what it was in the beginning of the century.
And it has declined to 7.4 in 2008. The latest S R S bulletin that I have at my disposure
from net is, S R S bulletin 2009. And S R S bulletin two 2009 published in october 2009,
I suppose gives the birth rate, death rate, growth rates and their confidence intervals,
95 percent confidence intervals for the year 2008.
And it shows that in year 2008, our death rate has declined to 7.4 per thousand population.
See, the change that in the beginning of the century, it was around 50 per thousand and
this declined to 7.4, a drastic reduction in death rate in only 80 years time. Actually,
one can even say in about 60 years time if we take 21 as the base year for high death
rate, then between 21 and 81, in only 60 years. Our death rate decline from 50-7.4. This was
the point I was making while commenting on growth rate of population in the developed
countries earlier. That what the developed countries did in about
300 years time? Say their death rate started declining around second part of 18th century
and continue to decline, for some countries even in the beginning of 18th century death
rates had started declining. So, from 18 to 18th full century, 19th, 20th century, death
rates continue to decline. Even now they are declining life expectancy is still increasing.
So, they took about 300 years time or, at least 250 years time for life expectancy to
increase from a low level of around 20 to a high level of around 80. And for death rates
to declined from around 40 or 50 to the present low levels of 6 or 7 or 8.
In India, this became possible in only 80 years time or even less than that 60, we say
that the major decline occur between 21 to 81 because between 11 and 21 as I said influenza
epidemic raise our death rate temporarily. So, in 60 years time, on the front of death
rate we have achieved what the developed countries took 300 years to achieve. And that explains
why the developed countries did not have this population explosion problem ever, which our
country or countries of less developing region had. Life expectancy which was around 20 in
the beginning of the century, rose to 31 in 31 to 41, 15 in 71 to 81 and has now gone
up to 64 for males and above 66 for female. S R S does not calculate life expectancy directly,
but there are technical methods. By using analytical methods and age specific
death rates from S R S and from other sources using indirect data of census and surveys.
Different demographers have made estimates of life expectancy for males and females.
I think for students like you, it will be good to depend on estimates provided by world
health organization. So, if you go to world health organization site, you find life expectancies
for all the countries of the world, for which reliable data exist and they have included
life expectancy for India also. India’s life expectancy today is around 64 for males
and 66 for females. So, see the increase in life expectancy from 20 to 66.
Now, after that, so this part decline in death rate from 50 to 7 and increase in life expectancy
form 20 to 66. This explains why population of India started growing at higher and higher
rates, up to 1951 at rate 1 percent, and after 1951 at rate more than 2 percent. After that
decline in birth rate followed, crude birth rate too declined in the 20th century. However,
it remained above 40 till 1971. So, despite the fact that, India was the first country
to launch family planning program officially in 1951 or 1950 whatever. In the first plan
period itself for independent, you can say as soon as we became independent.
Thanks to vision of the then prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, extensive who wrote it is
quite interesting to see if you read discovery of India. There are several pages devoted
to demographic transition theory. When I read discovery of India being a student of population,
I was surprised how much Jawaharlal Nehru knew about demographic transitions in the
developed countries. So, people like Jawaharlal Nehru, Gandhi and those others associated
with planning commission, congress, planning committees, they were all in favor of population
control. So, as soon as the country became free we launch an official family planning
program. But result in terms of birth rates, this family planning program did not produce
much results during first two decades and till 1971 our birth rate remained above 40.
It is stated declining only during 1971 to 81. Presently, it has come down to 22.8 and
there is evidence that it will decline further. So, birth rate which was also around 50 in
the beginning of the last century, has come to a level of 22.8. Death rate has come to
a level of 7 and birth rate has only come to a level of 22 there is a difference of
15 and that is why we have a growth rate of 1.5 percent per year.
Total fertility rate or average number of children declined from 6 to 7 in the beginning
of the last century. To 2.68 national family health survey for 2005-06 gives age specific
rates, age specific fertility rates on the basis of which by adding 5 year age specific
rates and multiplying the sum by 5, you can calculate total fertility rate. The total
fertility rate for India as a whole comes out to be 2.68 and as I have been repeating
that replacement fertility 2.1, we are yet to reach replacement level fertility of 2.1.
But 2.68 is not bad so, we are doing reasonably well looking at the fact that we are a developing
country, democratic country, level of poverty is still very high, illiteracy is high, number
of illiterate person has hardly declined during last 50 years.
So, keeping in view and the remoteness of areas in Jharkhand Chhattisgarh north east.
So, considering everything it is not a small achievement, our growth rate may have not
declined, but that is more because death rate has declined more than birth rate, but total
fertility rate has also declined to 2.68. But there are some states, where total fertility
rate is still quite high, U P and Bihar are two extremes. In U P, you have a fertility
of 3.82 and in bihar, the high the highest fertility in terms of total fertility rate
is for bihar which is 4.0. That means you know theoretically speaking if these rates
continue, then Bihar’s demographic scenario is such that in the next generation means
say at a gap of say 23 or 24 years, the population of Bihar would be doubling.
So, Bihar has a high rate of growth of population, U P too has a high fertility rate and so,
potentially high growth rate of population. Other states, many other states have done
well and their fertility rate has declined to less than 2.1.
Since, life expectancy has already reached 65 or 66, I said 64 for male, 66 for females.
It will be more and more difficult to improve it further. You know we must understand that
improvement of life expectancy from 20 to 50 is easier, it depends largely on control
of infection diseases. But to move beyond 50 or beyond 60, becomes progressively more
difficult because then to move beyond 60, we have to work at the level of socioeconomic
development, gender gap, stratification, urban rural gap, class gap and you have to provide
healthy living environment and nutritious foods and awareness and political stability
and many other things. So that your life expectancy can improve further.
So, for India, in looking at the demographic and socioeconomic and political situation
of India, our life expectancy of 66 is quite good. And one can say that in future, it will
be difficult to raise it further. So, in the future our growth rate will depend largely
on what happens on the front of fertility or family planning program. India is, but
one cannot forget the fact that India’s life expectancy is 10 to 15 years lower than
that of the industrially advanced countries. So, if you are 65, there already countries
in the developed world, where life expectancy has reached 80 or more than 80, 82 in some
cases, 82. So, we are still 15 years behind those developed countries and that means there
is lot more scope for life expectancy to increase. But that will depend more on socioeconomic
political situation rather than on instead of health infrastructure. The fertility will
decline further and therefore, the growth rate of population is likely to decline in
the future.
There are more reasons for birth and growth rate to decline. There is one more reason
why the growth rate will decline further, that is the effect of age distribution called
population momentum? You see in demography, we have concept of population momentum, which
is like this. A country which has a total fertility rate of 2.1 is potentially a country
where size of population becomes stationary. But this does not happen immediately and that
does not happen because of the wastages of the past in terms of age composition. If your
age composition is young, then at a lower level of total fertility rate you are producing
more number of children. If your age composition is old, then at the same level of total fertility
rate you are producing less number of children. That means number of birth depends not only
on total fertility rate, but also on the age distribution of population.
So, in the future when total fertility rate will be declining more and our age distribution
will also be age-ing. The combined effect of the two factors will reduce the level of
birth rate further. It will take a few decades for the population to stabilize because in
the mean time more and more people will enter reproductive ages, then produce their first
and second child, you know it is simple. Initially, when you motivates some couples for family
planning program, then if the population age distribution is young. That means you motivate
n number of persons to go for family planning at a particular age say 30, but next year
number of persons are 30 is more than compensated because your age distribution was young.
So, more persons have entered 30, then the persons who are motivated to go for family
planning. And that is why initially for sometime, age composition affect can neutralize your
efforts in the field of family planning. When fertility was high, nearly 40 percent population
of India was below the age of 14, with decline of fertility this percentage has come down.
And as time passes this will grow I mean this problem will or this phenomenon will get aggregated
and proportion in 0 to 14 will decline further. Therefore, the country will continue to have,
right now because of young age distribution. The country will continue to have positive
growth rate for several decades. Even if we achieve a total fertility rate of 2.1 over
night suppose, tomorrow when you wake up, you find that India’s total fertility rate
has declined to 2.1 miracle, it will be miraculous, but this miracle does not mean that India’s
growth rate of population will become 0. It will still take decades that is because as
time passes, children will grow, enter the reproductive period marry and produce children,
we are a young age distribution. In the Tenth Five years plan it was estimated
that the contribution of age distribution to growth of India’s population is about
60 percent very interesting. We said that India has high fertility for several reasons;
one reason is age distribution, another reason is high mortality and the third reason is
unmet need for family planning. High mortality means because we have high mortality so, people
want to produce more number of children than they desire. So that at least some of them
would survive, that is the effect of mortality. That means if child mortality declines, if
infant mortality declines and people are sure that if they produce two children, both of
them will survive.Then they need not produce three children, they will produce only two.There
is 20 percent contribution of this high mortality. There is 20 percent contribution of unmet
need for family planning. There are several couples 20 percent you can say there are around
20 percent couples in India who do not want to produce any child further. But due to want
of acceptable convenient safe method of contraception of their life, they are not using any family
planning method. If you look at statistics of family planning in India, then an overwhelming
majority of people are using sterilization and that too female sterilization which effect,
which is also connected to what is in sociology call patriarchal society, we are a patriarchal
society. If we want to go for sterilization, we force our women only to go for surgical
operation. We think that it will not be wise or safe or for men to go for surgical operation.
Though the fact is that male sterilization is much much simpler it is two minute job
as compare to women sterilization. And third factor is age distribution. I was
surprise to read in Tenth Five year plan, that there is 60 percent contribution of age
distribution. There is 20 percent contribution of high fertility of high mortality, 20 percent
contribution of unmet need for family planning and 60 percent contribution of age distribution.
And, I have an interesting quote for you, this is from Eleventh Five year plan. Considerable
achievements have been made over the last 6 decades means, after independence. In our
efforts to improve health standards such as life expectancy, child mortality, infant mortality
and maternal mortality. Small pox and guinea worm have been eradicated and there is hope
that poliomyelitis will will be contained in the near future. Nevertheless problems
abound malnutrition affects a large proportion of the population sorry, malnutrition affects
a large proportion of children. And an unacceptably high proportion of population continues to
suffer and die from new diseases, that are emerging H I V.
Or now, you know about Dengue and you know about Swine flu, Encephaloid, Japanese encephalitis,
there are many new diseases. Apart from continuing and new threats post by the existing ones.
Pregnancy and child birth related complications also contribute to the suffering and mortality.
So, we have to do a lot on the field of reduction in death rate, this is overall situation.
But overall situation presents a quite optimistic picture, in terms of life expectancy. We have
risen from 20 to 66 and in terms of birth rate, in terms of total fertility rate, we
have achieved 2.6, we have come down from 7 and our birth rate has come down to around
15. It is not a mean achievement, this is at the national, but I also said that there
are some states in in the country like U P and Bihar. Bihar has a total fertility rate
of 4. So, Bihar and Kerala present two contrasting pictures within the country.
So, it becomes important for us to look at regional diversity in birth and death rates.
I have produced a table for you, which is this presents the S R S means sample registration
scheme estimates of death rates, birth rates and natural growth rates for different states
of India. Separately for rural and urban areas for the year 2008, it also present the estimates
of infant mortality rates for different states, natural growth rate is simply the difference
between and death rates. The table clearly demonstrates that there is a large variation
of birth rate in different states of India. And variations in death rates are comparatively
small. So, almost all states have achieved lower level of death rate, but birth rate
difference remain. The table also shows that there are significant
variations in birth and death rates by urban and rural residence. So, in each states, you
find that birth and death rates in urban areas are lower than birth and death rates in rural
areas. As a rule urban areas have lower birth rates as well as death rates. Yet, since the
urban-rural difference in birth rates is larger than in death rates, urban areas show a lower
rate of natural growth than rural areas.
Specifically about some states like Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and
Orissa have a high death rate. Normally, the states which have high death rate they also
have high birth rate, but there are exception. Orissa has low birth rate, but high death
rate. Bihar has high birth rate, but relatively low death rate I do not know how to explain
this. Economically their situation seems to be similar, but Orissa has high death rate,
low birth rate. Bihar has relatively high birth rate, but relatively low death rate
very contrasting picture. Orissa has the highest value of infant mortality
rate among all the states of India. One may say that differences in Indian states are
analogues to differences in the world regions. Demographically, Kerala constitute the Europe
of India Orissa Uttar Pradesh and Bihar constitute the Africa of India. There is a need to find
the special differences in demography. The political unity of India will depend heavily
on the extent to which we can curtail the demographic diversity between different states
and union territories. I remember professor Bose often saying that;
if you take per capita income, it is income divided by population. Now, there are some
states where income is increasing fast and population growth rate is sinking. So, these
are the states which are making rapid stride in development. There are other states where
income growth is sluggish or absent not growing as fast as other states, but their population
is rising faster. So, due to twin effect of sluggish improvement in numerator, but rapid
improvement in denominator. You find that there are increasingly lagging behind, the
other states where reveres is the situation. And, how long can this situation continue?
In the same state, if some states improve due to effect of demographics and economics
and other states deteriorate, it may become a political problem to keep all types of states,
then together. You cannot stop people aspiration, people’s aspirations are not depend on the
states to which they belong. So, if there is a state where total fertility is high or
highest and per capita income is low. We cannot say that people of this states should not
aspire the same living standards. They should aspire for lower living standard, then people
of those states where income is high and growth rate of population is low.
Reach of media is everywhere, everybody is watching the same T V, same T V programs,
same T V channels. Every everyone in all parts of the states in all parts of the country
is exposed to the same westernization effect. So, if aspirations are same, but gaps are
increasing. It can become politically difficult to keep India united. To keep India united,
we have to attack our demographic diversity, look at this state pictures.
For India as a whole it shows that the birth rate of India is 22.8, rural area it is 24.4,
urban areas it is 18.5. Death rate is 7.4 total, rural areas 8.0, urban areas 5.9. There
is a significant difference in death rate between rural and urban areas. A difference
of two point one points, natural growth total natural growth is 15.4 per thousand since
it is express more in percentage form so we can say 1.54 percent. In rural areas, growth
rate of population is 1.65 percent and in urban areas, it is 1.26 percent. This also
shows that growth of population due to natural factors alone is much higher in rural areas
than in urban areas. Now, if on the one hand rural population is increasing faster due
to effect of the difference between birth and death rates.
But on the other hand, you find that the productivity the resources in rural areas is not improving.
Growth rate of agriculture income or contribution to agriculture and total gross domestic product
of the country is not increasing. It is actually declining that means, population is increasing
and productivity of resources is declining, unemployment is declining. More people are
unemployed or under employment underemployed. So, they are forced to migrate to urban area.
You go to any tribal particularly forest area, you find that half of the village has migrated
they call it [FT] in Madhya Pradesh, in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh wherever I went in tribal or
forest areas I would find that fifty percent of their houses are locked. Or only old people
or small children are living in there. And adults men, women they have migrated to some
city of some other state or the same state or a neighboring district at least in search
of employment. Infant mortality is still very high, though it has come down a lot. There
was a time when infant mortality in many countries was as high as 250 or 300 or even more. Today
infant mortality in India as a whole is 53, in rural areas it is 58 and urban areas it
is 36, urban areas have improved a lot in terms of health indicator. So, infant mortality
is only 36. But you find lot of differences in birth rate,
death rate, infant mortality rate from state to state. If I try to indentify some states
where infant mortality rate is very high, then this Orissa 69. In Orissa, in the total
population of Orissa infant mortality rate is 69. That means in a year in when 1000 children
are born 69 of them die before celebrating first birth day. And only 931 survive. There
are urban, rural differences. In rural areas, it is 71. In urban areas it is 49. You must
notice that even in the urban areas infant mortality rate in Orissa is quite high.
There is another state where urban infant mortality is equally bad 49 and that is Uttar
Pradesh. In Uttar Pradesh infant mortality rate in urban areas is as high as in Orissa.
And this Chhattisgarh is also not in a good situation 48 at difference of only 1. The
difference of 1 may not carry much sense when data have come from sample. S R S also gives
us confidence intervals of these rates, but since my purpose was only to compare states.
I am not giving you figures of confidence intervals
It is clear that there are some states like Orissa Bihar Uttarpradesh Chhattisgarh where
death rates are infant mortality rates are quite high. On the other hand if you look
at kerala, where is kerala? Because we are all the time talking about Kerala. In Kerala
this is Kerala 11. In Kerala you find that the infant mortality rate is 12, in rural
areas it is 12. In urban areas it is 10. There is another smaller state Manipur. In Manipur
you find that the infant mortality rate in urban areas is as low as 8. So, if we take
infant mortality rate of developed countries like Japan to be standard where only one or
two children die during infancy. Then our Manipur state is very close to achieve
in that level. That there are other states like Orissa or Chhattisgarh or Uttarpradesh
where infant mortality has lot of scope to decline, something has to be done about these
states in particular. So that their infant mortality rate can decline. And when infant
mortality rate will decline, this will provide encouragement to couples to produce smaller
number of children.
Now, there are negative implications of growth rate, there are positive implications of growth
rate. Among the negative implications of growth rate, we have seen that after independence
population of India grew at rate more than 2 percent per year, which means high demographic
investment. That just to maintain the same level of per capita income, you have to make
huge investment in economy. In a poor economy, in which consumption requirements are not
satisfied for in large proportion of population. You have to make huge demographic investment
even to remain at the same level. So, rough calculation would show that if capital
output ratio is 4 in industry. It is 4 or more, then if a population is increasing at
say 2.25 percent per year. Then 10 percent of your investment is required just to maintain
the present level. If your economy invest is about 10 percent you remain where you are,
there is no change, no improvement. And this explains why after independence for a long
period of time. We had a rate of growth in per capita income of only one percent per
year, which some people call hindu rate of growth. It was in only in Ninth Five year
plan and then in Tenth Five year plan that we became unhindu and our growth rate of per
capita started improving. Otherwise, we remained hindu for a long time.
Then those who claimed that population growth is bad for development, they may argue as
follows. If the national income or total value of goods and services produce in a country
grows at 2.5 percent a year and the population also grows at the same rate, in terms of income
per capita, the country will remain where it is. This had serious implication for Indian
society. The issue to what extent high population growth can hamper development however, it
is controversial. Development is if a factor which is influence not only by demographers,
but also by ethical, ideological, factors, resources and state policies. So, this is
what I was saying hindu rate of growth. We have had hindu rate of growth for several
decades.
But there are positive, but there are some positive effects of population growth also
among the most vocal person was born Juliansimon, a professor of disease administration, at
the university of Maryland. Who argued that in the shorten positive growth rate of population
may hamper growth of national income in per capita term, but in the long run say after
20 years or so the population is going to gain, if it has positive rate of growth.
In case of India, India has had M B C S economic plans and declarations on the part of political
leaders that India is fast catching up with the west and this has created aspirations.
But it has also produce more inequalities, our economic planning has produce more inequalities
or exclusionary growth, that is why Eleventh Five years plan say that we must go for exclusionary
growth. And the gap between those who are working in organize sectors, mostly in big
cities and those who are working in unorganized sectors that there are seven states, which
have already reached below replacement fertility they are Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Tamilnadu, Kerala,
Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Sikkim.
There are three other states that have replacement level fertility and there is a need to examine
death, what factors have led to below replacement level fertility in this diverse states. Another
is issue is whether in these states fertility will stabilize at the present low level or
it will continue to decline further or are they are some states or some pockets, where
they are going to experience the third transition. Means, some improvement in fertility after
it has declined to a low level.
The Himachal Pradesh model can be worth considering. It has lowest incidence of domestic violence,
highest contraceptive prevalence, what has made all this possible in Himachal Pradesh?
Knowledge and availability of family planning methods are universal and the unmet needs
of the family planning are minimum.
But ironically Himachal Pradesh is not at the top, in terms of improvement in infant
child mortality, antenatal care or institutional delivery it also has lowest level of urbanization.
My hunch is that perhaps in Himachal Pradesh rate of abortion must be high. Somebody has
to study in-depth, the Himachal Pradesh model why despite certain adverse socioeconomic
conditions Himachal Pradesh has joined the group of below replacement fertility recently.
Now, there are some caused of transition demographers say that it has related to individualization,
increasing freedom of women, increasing pension benefits or social security program, lessening
your dependence on your children and migration and economic deprivation in some cases, then
also cause low fertility.
One of the interesting aspects of fertility is that, in the country as a whole if you
look at those who are high school pass women who are high school pass their total fertility
rate has already gone to below replacement level. So, perhaps education of women is a
major factor.
This diagram shows the differences in total fertility rate, which I have already commented
upon and the diagram is obvious.
In state like Uttar Pradesh, where fertility is high. You can may guess that one of the
reasons is high dropout rate, you see enrolment rate in age group 11 to 14 among girls drops
to 46. Initially, it is 109 that means initially in age group 6 to 11 most girls or all girls
are going to school, but by the time they reach 11 to 14, more than half of them dropout.
So, enrolment rate reduces to 46. 14 to 16 years, it reduces to 36.28 and in the age
group 16 to 9 16 to 18, it reduces to as lower level as 19.3, 80 percent or more than 80
percent of girls in age group 16 to 18 are outside school or university.
More on determinants of fertility depends on age of marriage, fecundity, sexuality,
modern, family planning methods, abortion practices, we have discussed them at length
earlier.
We can broadly divide all these factors into family planning and beyond there is direct
effect of family planning, there other factors education, empowerment of women etcetera or
infant mortality which comes under.
Beyond family planning and the differences in birth and death rates. Particularly, birth
rates are more due to both family planning and beyond family planning. You see there
are tremendous differences in family planning. On the one hand we have West Bengal where
close to three fourth of all the married couples are using contraceptive practices. And there
is Nagaland in which only 41.9 percent couples are using family planning methods, in Bihar
50 percent couples are using family planning methods.
So, the broad scenario is that India is making progress in all fronts. Knowledge of family
planning has already become universal. And 64 percent couple are using family planning
methods, there is also improvement in socioeconomic condition and women are more empowered today,
this is family planning, this is beyond family planning.
Due to westernization modernization and state efforts, significant changes are taking place
in the age of marriage, again beyond family planning.
Parents have started recognizing the importance of girl’s education and empowerment And
all this is going to help India in proceeding further on the path of demographic transition.
Yet there are several impediments to social progress.
And they can broadly be divided into these factors tradition, patriarchal society, low
age of marriage, then after marriage women joining their husband’s family. In sociological
language we say patriarchal and patrifocal, we are not only patriarchal, but we are also
patrifocal and that effects status of women. So, ways have to be found to change the value
system which do not serve any function now, may be at one time this help some function,
but today they do not serve any function, rather they have become source of many problem.
So, this is all that in brief I told today that in terms of death rate, we have made
tremendous progress our death rate has declined to nearly 7, our life expectancy has gone
up to 65. In fertility we also have made significance progress in our fertility has declined from
7 to nearly 2.6. But there are noticeable differences between states and for the future
of for a good future of India for unity and integrity of India, for political stability.
Not only for economic development, but for political stability. We have to fight these
differences in demographics between different states of India. Otherwise, with rising and
similar aspirations for development in all the states of India, this demographic and
economic differences can lead to secessionism, son of soil and many problems of that kind.
So, there is a connection between demographic, socioeconomic and political problems. And
today I focus particularly on differences in birth and death rates. And I also said
that difference in birth rates are partly due to differences in family planning and
partly due to differences in beyond family planning. Beyond family planning covers age
of marriage, empowerment of women, education, enrolment rates and related issues social
development in brief. I think you have some questions in your mind at this stage so, please
ask your question. Thank you sir, for giving such a good lecture
on the demographic processes, I think due to paucity of time we could not discuss on
about certain terms. So, my first question is what exactly is natural growth rate? And
how is it estimated the natural growth rate? You see there are two types of growth rates;
one growth rate which is estimated from population data obtained from censuses. In censuses you
have figures of population at two census dates. And by using either using simple decadal growth
rate method population, say in population of 2001 minus population, population of 2001
minus population of 1991 divided by population of 91 multiplied by 100. The usual method
of calculating percentage increase in population. That is called decadal growth rate.
And if you divide that decadal growth rate by 10, you get something like percent increase
per year because there is gap of 10 years at which census is conducted. That tells us
the overall every year on the average, what percent of change is taking place in the population.
Natural growth rate has a different connotation. This natural growth rate refers the difference
between birth rate and death rate. Now, this birth rate and death rate and when S R S gives
you natural growth rate of 1.5, it means the birth rate of 2008 minus death rate of 2008,
it is not for a decade. Since, in 2008 birth rate is much lower than the birth rate that
has that may have been during the period 1991 to 2001. So, you will have a lower natural
rate of growth. In absence of migration, natural growth rate
and growth of population will be same. So, if India’s population is not effected by
international migration. Then the natural growth and overall growth rate of population
will be same and which is the case. So, you can better rely on S R S figures rather than
census figures. Census figures tell us about the decade and S R S figures tell us about
the contemporary situation. So, I can say that today population of India is growing
at a rate 1.5 percent per year because the difference in birth rate of India and death
rate of India as of today is of 15 per thousand. Sir, what could be the reasons behind high
in urban areas in some of the sates of India? This is this for this we have to look into
two things, one the definition of urban population. Normally, when I use a term urban population,
immediately it can among students of sociology it can evoke the image of Bombay Mumbai or
Calcutta now Kolkata or Delhi or Bangalore. But urban areas can have very rural like character
because by definition any place with a size of population more than 5000 can be classified
as urban. So, there are many urban areas, which are rural in character small, there
are tiny towns, there are small towns and there are casbahs, notified areas, town area
committee, they are also urban areas. So, in those states where there are very few metropolitan
centers and most of the urban population is concentrated in a smaller town, smaller cities
notified areas, they are urban rural difference would be less.
And second thing that in these states where urban infant mortality or urban mortality
is higher, that also mean that these are the states where even in the urban areas health
infrastructure is not properly developed, public health system is not properly developed.
It is inefficient may be there is problem of governance, there is problem of corruption,
there is problem of lack of commitment or lack or resources so it is on both account.
The character of urban population in those states and lack of health infrastructure and
something wrong with governance of the states. So, combine effect of all these things is
that urban areas too have high death rate. And sir, lastly in current scenario most of
the couples are going for late marriages so does this have it is re-precaution on fertility
and growth rate? Yeah, it will have. If people go for late
marriage that means the reproductive period which is available for reproduction is truncated
on the left hand side of the distribution. So, they they are not constantly reproducing
for 30 years from 15 to 45. They marry at say 27 or 28, and so it is from 27 or 28 to
45 not from 15 to 45, that they have time for reproduction. And the factors because
of which age of marriages risen, from 14 to 28 or also associated with the factors because
of which reproduction closes at say 35 or 36 it does not go up to 45. So, the reproductive
period is truncated from both sides left hand side, right hand side and normally women produce
two or three children. And lastly sir, you mentioned about a term
fecundity, could you explain what is fecundity? In population literature, we make a difference
between fertility and fecundity and fecundability, there are three terms. Fertility, fecundity
and fecundability. Fertility refers to actual birth performance. So, when I say that total
fertility rate of India is 2.6 it means on the average a woman is producing 2.6 children.
The term fecundity refers to biological capacity to reproduce. Biological capacity to reproduce
is much higher know the other day using the model of bongaart, I was saying that as far
as capacity to produce children is concerned. Theoretically a woman can produce 40 children
in entire life time. This fecundity is biological capacity to reproduce, it may not be 40 children,
it may be 30 25 or 20 or whatever. Or at considering socio cultural and all kinds of factors say
15 so, fecundity is 15, fertility is 2.6 that is the difference. Which truth that a fertility
is declining it is not because biological capacity to produce baby is declining, no.
Actually, changes in certain cultural factors like now, women spend more time with their
husbands, there is improvements in nutrition, leading to reduction in, spontaneous abortion
and so. Biological capacity to produce babies is increasing, but total birth performance
is decreasing. Fecundity is increasing and fertility is declining. And the third term
fecundability refers to probability of conceiving during a month of explosure.
Means, if husband and wife are living together and they are having sex, then in a month what
is the probability of getting conceived? Usually, the probability of getting conceived that
also, that depends on so many behavior patterns, but we can take it to be around 0.3 which
means that if husband and wife is living together, then on the average waiting time for conception
would be around three months or three and a half months. So, these are three different
things. When demographic transition is occurring, it is not because of it is a good question
you ask it is not because of decline in biological capacity to reproduce children. It is more
because of use of family planning or or beyond family planning things empowerment. Ultimately,
conscious limitation of family size that fertility is declining. Thank you.