The Number Game

(this article originally appeared on the blog 'Lord of the Flies')

The 18th of November, 2013: India is the world’s second most populated country with a population of approximately 1.24 billion, just trailing behind China at 1.36 billion. Which is to say, 17.4% of the world’s people live in India. The United States of America, the third most populated country, is way behind at 3.17 million. 

As an Indian, how do I feel about this? Well... let me remember, how I had felt when I had topped that attendance-shortage list in my college in almost every course (“ouch! Did I skip that many classes?”). Definitely not upset, especially savouring how good the letters of my name looked on the top of a list. But worried, yes, of the consequences. 

India is still a developing country, with a lot of people living below the poverty line. There are also too many administrative problems within. And yet in spite of everything the population just keeps growing and exacerbates the existing situation. The rate of development going hand-in-hand with the rate of population growth is ultimately causing the country to remain in the same place. 

But has this always been the case? Has India always been so populated? What makes India different in this matter, or rather, how and when exactly did Indians get so horny? 

Population census wasn’t common in the past- that makes it difficult to trace a history. Nevertheless, let me try my best. 

The Harappa Civilization rose and fell in the Northwest, around 5000 BC. No one knows what exactly had happened, but is speculated that the few who survived fled the place and mixed with the local population in the other parts of the country. Who were these indigenous local people? Nobody knows. 

Around 1000 BC came the Aryans, most probably from somewhere North, with their then superior technology of welding iron and the Hindu religion. They settled down comfortably. Over time, they mixed with the local population. (This theory is highly controversial, recent research based on genetics goes against it.) 

In the mean time, with a long coastline of about 7,500 km, influx of people in boats continued from lands unknown. 

There was no conspiracy. With plenty of natural resources, India seemed to be a dream country, a country for everyone. Whoever came, stayed back. 

Buddhism was born around 400 BC, and the Indian Emperor Ashoka, finding solace in it from the wars of the past, embraced it and sent word through missionaries travelling far and wide. 

And yet India was pretty isolated, with the mighty Himalayas in the North and the Indian Ocean in the south, immune to invasions as long as the North-western borders were secure. Nor did the Indian kings have any desire of expanding their Empire beyond these boundaries. Our only connections with the outside world were the Arabian traders, who frequently came to trade via the older version of the Grand Trunk Road. It was under this safe haven that the population continued to flourish unabated, and still there was always plenty for everyone. 

But the political situation would weaken periodically, during which social evils would creep in and start building up in the society over time. The caste system became abusive. The widows were certainly not a happy lot. Also people continued to be married off very young (more babies!). 

Around 1200 AD, the Turks plundered some parts of Northern India for the first time, taking advantage of the weak political situation. I guess India never really recovered because immediately there was an influx of Mughals, entering from the Northwest. But this time, India was not plundered. The Mughals also stayed back. They were soon joined by rulers from parts of modern-day Iran in the Southern part of India. In the South, the populations got mixed once again but there was more resistance in the North. 

Nevertheless, the population continued to grow. 

After the Mughals entered the picture, there was certainly a strong religious divide between the local kingdoms that held against the Mughal rulers and the Mughal kingdoms. Due to continuous wars and more male-centric policies, the male child became more important, and the richer people usually continued to produce babies till they had a satisfactory number of male children. Also, polygamy was not uncommon under the Mughal rule. 

Over the course of time, many religious reformation movements took place and new religions like Sikhism and Jainism were born. Hinduism also got fragmented to different philosophies. Under the new Muslim rulers, many local people started adopting Islam, accelerated by favourable policies, although the majority still remained Hindu. In the meantime, the Christian missionaries also started to arrive on the coastal region and encouraged many people to convert to Christianity. 

The Spanish came, and the Portuguese. They settled in small parts of the coastline, building their port-cities. But they were mostly traders, and sometimes started settling down. 

And the population, of course, was booming. 

The first colonisers were perhaps the French, who conquered the Eastern part of India. But they were soon outdone by the British. By exploiting the religious and linguistic diversity of the people and the disunity among the Indian rulers, the British succeeded in colonising large parts of India. It wasn’t easy since there was a strong presence of the Indian Civilization, but the British were good at their game. Initially there was diplomacy, the battles happened afterwards. 

Unlike the previous visitors, however, the British didn’t stay. They continued to be colonisers, with allegiance to the British Crown. The wealth and natural resources of the land were being used to fuel the Industrial Development, and later the Arms race, back home, compromising the requirements of the local population. Poverty set in more strongly than ever before. 

Along with furthering social problems, poverty itself breeds more poverty. Of course, poverty killed people but there were more being born. Under poverty, more children mean more security, more help at work and more income. Also, in the absence of quality forms of entertainment, amidst a stage in life where you see no purpose, abstinence is sure difficult. Birth-control measures weren’t in then. Here, I’d like to digress a bit and say that it is often erroneously believed that poverty is the primary reason for India’s burgeoning population growth. It is rather the other way round, that the growing population is keeping poverty alive. Poverty is a secondary factor. The real, and pretty obvious, reason why India and China have such huge populations is because they started very early. That, combined with the monsoons and the numerous rivers which meant that there would always be food for everyone. This also attracted more people from outside to come and settle here. Under the protective cover of well-established civilisations, the populations could comfortably grow. The population of Europe started catching up with this rate only after the Industrial Revolution. 

Amidst this poverty and religious divide, weakened by the split into Pakistan (and not all muslims chose to go to Pakistan), India became independent in 1947. Ever since independence, the life-expectancy doubled and the infant mortality rate fell, but that went hand-in-hand with popularisation of birth-control measures and so the rate of growth of population slowed down. Women immediately got equal rights in all aspects, constitutionally (although, religions are still allowed to continue their traditional practices if they wish to). Unlike many other parts of the world, contraceptive measures and abortion did not conflict with the existing religious views, except for some sections of the society. The marriageable age has been increased but it has not been enforced very strongly because people don’t like it a lot. The sudden surge in education after independence, and the Indian media, have actually been the major contributors towards population control. As the cost of living increases, the poor are starting to realise that the problem of ‘more mouths to feed’ is greater than the advantages of having ‘more hands to work’. And the government is trying to help by encouraging and subsidising birth-control measures. 

Nevertheless, Indians still love kids. The growth rate has come down, but it’s still a positive number, which means the population continues to grow. Being a democratic country, India gives a lot of power to its people, so making a law which limits the family size is next to impossible. Such a government would be immediately voted out of power. China, being a communist nation has succeeded in this respect, although they have recently relaxed their one-child policy. 

Because of this huge population, India is first in many other arenas too, like having the largest number of poor, and having the largest number of people having HIV AIDS, etc. Whatever be their percentage, it is the sheer number which magnifies all the stats. It’s not easy to administer such a huge and diverse population. In spite of the developments in infrastructure and transport system, it is never able to keep up with the growing number of people who require them. 

So today, 1 in every 6 person lives in India! And with 50% of the population being below the age of 25 years, you can easily see that the population is only going to grow. It is predicted that India is going to surpass China in the population arena in a few decades. 

As we can infer, India has always been very populated. Although we must definitely stabilise the population, in my opinion it is futile to be more ambitious here. All we can do is educate more people and also make the best use of this human resource for the country’s development, and hope that everything will fall into place someday. 

Is India still a country for everyone? Although a lot of educated Indians emigrate to the developed countries is search for a better lifestyle, while the poor in the country continue to live in bad conditions, it is still going to be difficult for me to answer that question as ‘no’. India has never resisted immigration and continues to shelter every eccentric belief system that its people love. Even prostitutes and eunuchs have important roles in certain traditional rituals (although that has significantly diminished) and are thus an important part of the society. The country is a home to some of the richest people in the world as well as to some of the poorest. Students from poorer nations come to India for higher education. India remains hugely diverse with 1,642 spoken languages and 8 major religions, excluding the numerous tribal ones. 

India is also racially diverse. Although there are a lot of speculations, the truth is that we have absolutely no clues to our racial origins. In fact, we’re all pretty much mixed up and yet the mixing has been different in different parts of the country, so yes, we still look quite different from each other, much more different that a British dude would look from a Greek dude. 

Only the continent of Africa exceeds the linguistic, genetic and cultural diversity of India. 

What unites us, in spite of this diversity? We have no idea, but I guess it’s our common History. Whatever it is, we are still functioning, and that shows that it works! 

  

P.S.: Whenever someone picks up a debate with India in an online forum, no one can really keep up with the endless streams of comments form Indians - no matter good/bad, logical/illogical or hilarious... with so much support, it feels awesome, for once, to have such a large population!