The first hominids appeared in Africa around 5 million years ago, on a planet which is generally accepted to be 4600 million years old. The evolution of humankind was matched by its geographical diffusion.

It has been estimated that 10,000 years ago, when people first began to domesticate animals and cultivate crops, world population was no more than 5 million. Known as the Neolithic Revolution, this period of economic change significantly altered the relationship between people and their environments.

But even then the average annual growth rate was less than 0.1 per cent per year, which is extremely low compared to contemporary trends.

However, as a result of technological advancement, the carrying capacity of the land improved and population increased. By 3500 BC global population reached 30 million and by the time of Christ this had risen to about 250 million.

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Demographers estimate that world population reached 500 million by around 1650 AD. From this time population grew at an increasing rate. By 1830 AD, global population had doubled to reach 1 billion. In 1998, it was estimated that the population of the world was increasing at a rate of 78.7 million a year.

It had taken the entire evolution of humankind until 1960 to reach a global population of 3 billion but less than 40 years for this population to double itself. In the same year, the UN announced that 16 June, 1999 would be observed as the ‘Day of Six Billion’. Demographic trends in India

The excavations of Indus Valley sites reveal that Indian civilization was highly developed as far back as the 3rd or 4th millennium BC. Large, planned and populous cities, well built houses, temples and public buildings of brick and many other amenities had been developed by the people.

The other source of advanced culture was the Aryans. Three to seven thousand years ago, Indians possessed a technology sufficiently advanced to support a dense population; soils and climate being favourable for the application of this technology.

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The old literature, like the Rijjveda, the Brahmanas and the Buddhist literature make it clear that population was spread over wide areas in small villages, and that some of the villages had grown into towns and capitals with an urban mode of life.

Between the 7th and 4th centuries BC, the economy of India was comparable to diat of the later middle ages in Europe. Crafts and commerce were flourishing in a highly organized sector. The existence of dense population was confirmed by Alexander’s army, which invaded India in 327-26 BC.

In 1865, the British rulers of India decided in principle that a general population census should be held. The years 1867-72 were spent in census-taking. This is known as the census of 1872. It did not cover the entire country, yet it was a beginning.

The first complete census of population was conducted in 1881 throughout India. Since then, the Census of India has been conducting general census regularly, every ten years. Through the census it had collected information on population numbers, distribution, sex, age composition, literacy, rural and urban population percentage, death rate, birth rate etc.

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With a view to improve the quality and widen the scope of data, the Census of India has been modifying its schedule and questionnaire from time to time.

The trends of Indian population followed more or less the global patterns up to 1960s but took off at a greater rate after that. According to 1961 census, the population was 439.2 million, but in early sixties the population explosion’ took place and by 2001, the population had grown to 1027 million.

Growth

The term ‘growth of population’ is used to show the change in numbers of population of an area over a period of time. It may be positive or negative i.e. the population could have increased or decreased. This change is a result of either natural increase/decrease or mobility (in-migration/out-migration) of people.

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The natural increase or decrease is the differential of fertility (birth rate) and mortality (death rate). The higher is the gap between the two, higher is the rate of growth. The rate of growth increases with inward movement of people too.

The growth of Indian population has taken place mostly due to the natural increase. Medical innovation, development of infrastructure and increase in literacy brought about a quicker change in the population numbers.

The fertility rate remained more or less the same while the mortality rate plummeted, leaving a very wide gap. India entered die second stage of demographic transition in this period. This led to population explosion’ starting from the mid-sixties.

The growth rates of upwards of 20% were achieved and have been steadily maintained. From 1961 to 1981, the growth rates kept increasing as the fertility rate remained the same and mortality rate decreased very rapidly. At the same time, life expectancy also increased.

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The health infrastructure developed during the 2nd and 3rd Five Year Plans had started fructifying. Yet the growth rate was not uniform. Some areas experienced a higher growth rate than others.

The alarming increase in the population necessitated a fresh look at the population policy. Government of India initiated many schemes including literacy drives and mass media campaigns to curb the growing numbers.

These schemes yielded results as apparent from the decline in growth rate which started in 1981. By 2001, the growth rate had come down to 21.34%, fertility rate at below 30 per thousand and mortality rate stabilizing at 9.8. This marks the beginning of the third stage in the Demographic Transition.