Demographic factors of high fertility in India
Demographic Factors The following are the demographic factors that maintain fertility at a high level.
(i) Universality of Marriage – Marriage in India is considered an essential religious sacrament. That is why every person, no matter how poor he is, must marry.
He cannot participate in religious ceremonies without his wife. Here it is considered necessary to have a son to get rid of paternal debt. According to Hindu religion, if a couple does not have any son, then their souls do not get peace in the afterlife due to the absence of Pind, Shradh etc. People think of a sonless person as unlucky and of low status.
Here even in Muslim society, marriage is considered socially and religiously appropriate. Polygamy and remarriage are also prevalent among Muslims. In this way, every Indian considers it his religious and social duty to produce children by marrying, so it is natural for the birth rate to be high here. That’s why the birth rate here has also been very high.
(ii) Low Age at Marriage – The age of marriage in India is very low. The main reason for this is the practice of child marriage. Social, religious and cultural traditions are responsible for the low age of marriage. According to Indian religious scriptures, the marriage ceremony of a girl should be done before the attainment of puberty, that is, before menopause, otherwise her parents are hell-goers.
Therefore, marriage at a young age gives complete fertility to produce children, so more children are born and the birth rate is higher. girls in western countries. When they become full adults, they get married. The average age of marriage in England is 30 years for men and 25 for girls. But in India, the average age of marriage for men was 21 years and that for women was 15 years, which increased to 23 years and 17 years respectively in 1991.
Thus, the average age of marriage here is still very low compared to western countries. Hence the birth rate here has been high. According to some scholars, early marriage does not increase the fertility rate but decreases it.
Because early marriage is the cause of top widowhood. Early marriage increases the number of widows, but religious and social practices do not allow them to remarry, as a result of which child-producing widows are unable to produce children during the rest of their childbearing period.
(ii) Rural Society – Indian society is a rural society. Urbanization is less here as compared to other countries. In 1991 there were a total of 6.05 lakh villages and about 4,689 towns. Here 74.3% of the population lives in villages, where progress in urbanization is less.
In the year 1971, 19.91% of the population lived in cities, in 1981 it was 23.84%, in 1991 the percentage of people living in cities was 25.72% and in 2001 the percentage of total urban population in the country was 27.78%. Whereas 73% in America, 95% in Britain, 78% in Japan and 65% in Russia live in cities.
Large families are considered necessary from the point of view of the priority and security of agriculture in the villages. In villages, people are influenced by traditions and customs, so they think less about the measures to reduce the family. The social and economic conditions of the people in the cities are such that people start paying more attention to the small family. 0
Life Expectancy
Answer: Expectation of Life Life expectancy is an important aspect of the population problem. In simple words, the number of years a resident of a country can expect to live at birth is called its average or expected age. It mainly depends on the mortality rate and age at the time of death.
Obviously, if the mortality rate is high or the death occurs at a young age, the expected life expectancy will be small. Conversely, if the mortality rate is low or death occurs at an older age, the expected lifespan will be longer. Expected age is considered an important indicator of the health status of a country. It also introduces the civilization and economic development of the country, the more developed the country, the higher its life expectancy.
Prof 0 and Gansky have written, to know his standard of living, look at the life expectancy because there is no better measure than how many years of life a civilization gives to each person. “It not only throws light on the birth and death rates of a nation, but it can also estimate the facilities available to the people in a community.
Although life expectancy is more a matter of biology than demographics, yet in demographics it is studied using life tables and perhaps this is the reason why the importance of life tables has increased in modern times. Looking at the data related to the expected age in India, it is found that the rate of expected age is increasing continuously during the planned development period, which is an indication of the progress, prosperity and development of the country. Expected Age in India
Looking at the history of life expectancy, it is found that in 1881 the expected age of men was 23.67 and that of women was 25.58.
Expected age decreased in 1911
And it became 22.59 for men and 29.31 for women. In 1921 the expected age declined further to 20.91 and 19.42 for men and women respectively. After 1921, the expected life expectancy in the country gradually increased and later on, especially in 1951, the rate of growth accelerated.
The expected age has reached 32 years in 1951, 41 years in 1961 and 46 years in 1971 and 54 years in 1981 census. The average age has been increasing very rapidly over a period of time. It has almost doubled in the last thirty years. This indicates a slight rise in the standard of living in the country.
The expected lifespan depends on the mortality rate and the mortality rate itself depends on the epidemic, disease, living conditions, women’s care, infant mortality and nutritional content. The main reason for the long anticipated life expectancy in India was the high mortality rate till 1921.
Between 1881 and 1921, the death rate ranged from 40 to 48 per thousand, but after 1921, diseases have been controlled. Infant mortality has decreased (as delivery facilities have expanded and children’s health and hygiene are taken care of), literacy has increased, famine outbreaks have decreased.
Life Expectancy: in India and abroad
The average life expectancy in India, although has increased over the years, is still very low as compared to other countries of the world. For example, the expected age is 74 in the US, 71 in Australia and 77 in Japan and 76 in Canada, while it is only 54.4 years in India. India is still lagging behind many Asian countries in terms of expected age, far behind the western countries.
An important fact regarding the expected age in India is that the life span of women is less than that of men, whereas in Asia and Western countries it is almost equal or more than that of men. The main reason for the relatively short life span of women in India is the untimely death of women. There are also some reasons for this, such as – child marriage, purdah system, lack of maternity system, lack of knowledge of facilities related to delivery, poverty etc. In our country, more women die due to unreasonable motherhood. As a result, the life span of women in India is shorter than that of men.
According to a publication of the United Nations, “Census is the whole process of collecting, editing and publishing demographic, economic and social facts in relation to all the people living in a certain region at a given time.”
It is clear that under the census, not only the number of men and women is counted, but efforts are also made to depict their economic and social status clearly. How many people are living in a country? In order to get information about all of them, the government conducts research in a systematic way, which is called census.
In modern times, no important political planning of the country can be completed without census information. The study of census data helps us in employment, housing, agricultural development, transport and communication, development, development of education and health services, planning of migration etc. Definitions According to a document of the United Nations – “The whole method of collection and compilation and publication of economic and social information relating to a given number of people of a country or a limited territory at a given time.”
Features of Census- Some of the main features of Census are as follows
1. All the information related to the census is published.
2. In the census, information about any person is known directly from that person, that is, it is not known through registration method.
3. Often censuses are conducted at a fixed time interval (after 10 years).
4. In the census, information about the population is collected at a fixed point of time.
5. All the residents of the country are included in the census.
6. Census is of the residents of the entire border of the country.
7. In the census, because there is a need for extensive expenditure and organization etc., so it is done by the government.
It is to be seen here that generally the census has to be done after every 10 years. According to the recommendation of the United Nations, every country in the world should conduct census on or near the year ending with ‘O’ (eg 1960, 1970 and 1980 respectively:). There may be a difference in the month or day due to weather and surface characteristics.
The ill-effects of the purdah system, the purdah and the harsh custom –
Due to customs, information related to women is often found impure. The reason is that these information are often not given by the women of men themselves, but a man gives it predictably.
Incorrect age information
Indian statistics regarding age are often inaccurate. The main reason for this is the ignorance of the informers. Many people, not considering the importance of statistics, give wrong information, influenced by their customs, such as Hindus generally tell the age of their unmarried girls, because according to Hindu religion, girls should be married at a young age. . Similarly, bachelors or widowers tell their age less and old people increase their age.
houses
There is no hierarchy in the number of houses in the big cities of the country. As a result, many difficulties and inaccuracies are present in the calculation.
Unpaid service of enumerators
The enumerators do not get any salary for this work. That’s why they act carelessly. Generally, they also lack the ability to work.
Lack of comparability – The definitions of words and units used in different censuses keep on changing. Varies on the basis of geographical coverage and tabulation. First Burma (Myanmar) and Sri Lanka and then Pakistan was separated. Census of Dadra and Nagar Haveli was done in 1962. Therefore the data is not completely comparable.
impurity –
There is a lot of fault in the statistics related to marital status and religion. 8. Multi-purpose – Census is done for the fulfillment of different purposes at the same time, so there is lack of accuracy even when the expenditure is high.
Lack of conformity in classification and tabulation
Classification and tabulation have been done in different ways from different censuses. Due to lack of conformity, their comparison is impossible and their usefulness is reduced.
Suggestions for Improvement
There is no doubt that after independence there has been a lot of qualitative improvement in the census statistics, but still on the basis of the above shortcomings suggestions can be made for improvement, which will be beneficial for the 2011 census. Some suggestions are as follows-
Pre-training of enumerators-
It is very important that the enumerators should be properly trained before the start of the census work. After that there should be training of the enumerators, so that it can be known whether they have become fully qualified for this work or not.
public support-
The cooperation of the public is required for the accuracy of the census. In this context, it can be said that contact with the public should be maintained through continuous publicity work and suggestions of the public should be invited sometime before the census.
use of computer and equipment
Computer and mechanical tabulation should be used more and more in calculation, data, method, tabulation etc., so that the results obtained can be analyzed and published as soon as possible.
Remuneration paid to the enumerators as soon as possible –
The accuracy and adequacy of the data completely depends on the enumerators. The rewards for their work are given very little and that too very late. Therefore, their reward should be increased and payment should also be done soon, so that they can take more interest in the work.
Information on fertility and reproduction
Information related to fertility and fertility should also be collected for evaluation of population growth and family planning programme.
Stability in the classification of profession –
Due to the difference in the classification of professions in different censuses, comparison is not possible, so it is necessary that the basis of this classification should be made stable.
Appointment of women enumerators – Women enumerators should be appointed to take correct information from women, especially in rural areas.
There should be a certain limit of questions – the number of questions has been changing in different censuses. Due to the number of questions, the indicator does not give information very carefully, so the number of questions should be limited to 10 or 12.
The meaning of questions and words should be clear – Some questions and words whose meaning is unclear, should be clear, such as working / non working, village / city, educated / uneducated etc. The signer is also considered to be educated whereas educated should be considered as the one who can write and read a letter in the language of his interest. Similarly, eunuchs are counted among men, while they should be counted separately, so that the change in their number can be seen.