What are the causes of Increase in Birth Rate in India?

What are the causes of Increase in Birth Rate in India?

1. Causes for an Increase in Birth Rate

To understand the true nature of India’s population problem we must examine the causes of rapid growth of population.

1. Early and Universal Marriage:

The practice of marriage is both a religious and social ceremony which is the potent reason of the rapid increase in population of India.

About 80 per cent girls are married during the most fertile period of 15 to 20 years of age. But, in sharp contrast to this early reproduction age in our country, the percentage of unmarried girl, aged 30 in U.K. and 41 in U.S.A., is very high. Furthermore, by the age of 50 only 5 out of 1000 Indian women remain unmarried.

2. Joint Family System:

Joint family system is still prevalent in the large part of the country which supports to population growth. Despite the fact, joint family system has started disintegrating in big cities; even then it still is the common feature.

The joint family system induces young couples to have more children though they may not be in a position to support them. Thus, joint family system, to a greater extent, is responsible to increase population especially in rural areas of the country.

3. Widespread Poverty:

Another factor responsible for rapid growth of population is the widespread poverty. In; India per capita income is very low as compared to other advanced countries.

Nearly 32 per cent of population is below the poverty line. Eva those who are not below the poverty line are denied nutritious food and other amenities of life. Therefore, poverty is the main factor which is responsible against the acceptability of family planning programme properly by the poorer people.

4. Religious and Social Superstitions:

According to Hindu ideology, it is considered one’s dharma to have children. In any case, they must have a son because certain religious duties will be performed only by him and none else. Similarly, they should also have a daughter as the giving of a daughter in marriage is also an act high religious spirit.

In this way, such irrational attitudes are based on wrong religion and social norms laid down by man. The birth of child is considered to be a gift of god. On account of these religious and social superstitions there is no check on raised; population.

5. Lack of Education:

Education can go a long way to change the attitude of the people towards family, marriage and the birth of a child. As a mass of population! Uneducated and illiterate, they cannot take keen interest in scientific education. As a result, they will remain backward and follow old religious superstitions.

Education, this is a way to enlighten them and raise their standard of living. In India, only 56.34 percent population is literate according to the census of 2001.

6. Pre dominance of Agriculture:

India is an agricultural country and 67 per cent of population directly or indirectly is dependent on agriculture. This has not, much changed since 1901. In an agricultural economy, children find work easily on farms especially during the time of harvesting and sowing seasons.

Thus, such economies has bigger families while in industrially advanced society, people prefer small families on economic grounds. Thus agricultural economies are generally backward over-populated and faced with the problem of disguised unemployment.

7. Low Standard of Living:

As majority of people are illiterate and backward thus their standard of living is low as compared to their counter partners who are well educated and advanced. In backward areas, people are not in a position to educate wards.

As soon as they are able to earn something they are married. Besides, they have no other way of recreation and they consider it a mean of entertainment. As a consequence, there is rapid increase in population. ,

8. Decline in Mortality Rate:

The wide gap between the birth and death rate has considerably resulted in population explosion in the country. The death rate has declined dramatically due to control over many dreadful diseases.

They are plague, malaria, snip pox and tuberculosis. Fortunately, these chronic diseases are no longer a threat to the villagers. The growing awareness and facilities for sanitation and cleanliness has helped; reduce the incidence of mortality to a larger extent.

9. Control of Famines and Floods:

During the early years of 19th century, India witnessed countless famines and floods in the country. The Bengal Famine of 1943 had toll of lakhs. But, now these type of famines are the talk of past only. Moreover, increased network of transportation and cooperation among different nations has reduced impact.

During seventies and eighties some minor changes of drought occurred in the country. But in brief, any improvement in material well-being means a reduction mortality rates.

10. Slow Process of Urbanisation:

In India, the pace of industrialization is very slow which further slows down the process of urbanization in the country. As a result it failed to generate social forces as they are useful to bring down the birth rate.

No doubt, according to 1991 census, urban population has been recorded 23.78 per cent against 17.6 per cent in 1951. Still the pace of urbanization is rather slow as compared to other developed countries.