Population

India is one of the most populous countries of the world. Our country covers just 2.4% of the land area of the world whereas it is the home of about 17.5% of the world’s population. India is second only to China in terms of size of population. Our population is more than the population of the North America, South America and Australia put together. India’s total population is about five and a half times the Russia, 2.8 times the USA, 7 times the UK and 44 times that of Australia. The population of Uttar Pradesh alone is 1.5 times that of Japan and is more than the population of Bangladesh, Nigeria or Pakistan. Again, the population of India is one and a half times the total population of the whole continent of Africa.

Distribution of Population

The total population of India according to the 2011 census in 1210.2 millions. The distribution of India’s population is very uneven. The contrasts in population distribution are quite clear at the level of the states, and are further sharpened at the level of districts. These contrasts are due to varying size of the states and wide variations in their resource base. Uttar Pradesh has the largest population of 199.5 millions. This is followed by Maharashtra (112.3 millions), Bihar (103.8 millions), West Bengal (91.3 millions) and Andhra Pradesh and Telangana (84.6 millions). ese six states account for about half of the country’s population. More than one-fourth of our people live in two-states of U.P. and Maharashtra alone. is, however, does not imply that states with large areas have large population also. For example, Rajasthan is the largest state of India accounting for over 10.4 per cent area of the country. But this state supports only 5.05 per cent population of India.

Similarly, Madhya Pradesh, the second largest state in terms of area, has 6.0 per cent of population on 9.38 per cent area of the country. Contrary to it, Uttar Pradesh supports 16.49 percent of population on only 7.33 per cent of area of the country. In fact, U.P. has more people than the two largest states of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. The three southern states of Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu together have less population than Uttar Pradesh, Bihar has 9.0 percent of population on 9.86 percent of area. In all, in eleven states and six union territories population size is much larger in comparison to their areas. This means that these states have higher pressure of population than the national average.

On the other hand, Jammu and Kashmir covers 6.76 percent area but supports only 1 per cent population of India. Arunachal Pradesh has 0.11 per cent of population on 2.55 per cent of area, Sikkim, a Himalayan mini-state has only 6 lakh population which is only 0.05 per cent of the total population of India. In fact, Sikkim has the smallest population among all the states of India. Delhi with 16.75 million has the largest population among all the union territories. It is a matter of fact that more people live in Delhi than in the state of Jammu and Kashmir or in all the Union Territories put together.

Distribution of Population, sex ratio, density and decadal growth rate of population: 2011