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Facts and figures from the 2001 Census of India
- The 2001 Census records that India's population increased by 180.6 million since 1991. This is more than the population of Brazil, which is the fifth most populous country.
- The Provisional Population Totals (PPT) (Census of India 2001) pegs the Indian population at 1,027,015,247 as of March 1, 2001.
- India is the second country, after China, to cross the 1 billion mark
- As of now, India supports 16.7 per cent of the estimated world population of 6.055 million, but the country's land mass is a mere 2.4 per cent of the world's surface area.
- India's numbers beat the third most populous country, the USA, by a margin of 746 million.
- Among the six most populous countries, India's sex ratio at 933 females to 1,000 males is the lowest. Although this is a marginal improvement over the 1991 Census figure of 927 females to males, it is still a considerable decline from the high of 972 in 1901.
The PPT (Census 2001) statistics suggest to Ravi Duggal, convenor of the Centre for Enquiry into Health and Allied Themes, that pre-birth sex determination and sex-selective abortions have become very common. According to him, the sex ratio decline in itself suggests the extent of the practice. He feels that it is no coincidence that developed states like Punjab, Haryana, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu, which have the largest infrastructure for amniocentesis laboratories and ultrasonography centres also have the lowest, and continually declining, sex ratios in the country (The Times of India, May 24, 2001). The states of Maharashtra, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Chhatisgarh are the states which have mainly contributed to this downward trend. - The literacy campaign, has led to more positive statistics in the PPT (Census 2001). There has been a decline in the number of illiterates, from 328.16 million in 1991 to 296.2 million in 2001. The percentage of literacy in India is 65.38 per cent. Male literacy is at 75.85 per cent. Female literacy (of those aged above 7 years) is only 54.16 per cent. The male-female literacy gap is 21.70 per cent. Kerala with 90.92 per cent literacy continues to top the list. Mizoram has the second-best literacy rate and it has a minimum gap in male-female literacy rates -- 4.56 per cent.
- Nineteen Indian states have a population of more than 10 million.
- Uttar Pradesh continues to be the most populous state. Its population of 166.05 million is more than the population of Pakistan.
- Nearly half the country's population lives in five states: UP, Bihar, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh.
- In the north-east, Sikkim (with 0.05 per cent of the country's population), Mizoram (0.09 per cent), Arunachal Pradesh (0.11 per cent), Nagaland (0.19 per cent), Meghalaya (0.22 per cent), Manipur (0.23 per cent) and Tripura (0.31 per cent) are the least populous states.
- In north India, the three states whose population is less than 1 per cent are: Himachal Pradesh (0.59 per cent), Uttaranchal (0.83 per cent) and Jammu & Kashmir (0.98 per cent).
- All ten states with less than 1 per cent population are hill states.
- Rajasthan, Arunachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Jammu & Kashmir and Maharashtra are the states with the lowest density of population.
- The national population density is 324 persons per sq km.
- Delhi is the state with the highest density of population: 9,294 per sq km.
- Arunachal Pradesh has the lowest density population: 13 persons per sq km.
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