. S ize and G rowth of I ndia ’ s P opulation India is the second most populous country in the world after China, with a total population of crores (or . billion) according to the Census of India . As can be seen from Table , the growth rate of India’s population has not always been very high.
Between – the average annual growth rate did not exceed . %, a modest rate of growth. In fact between and there was a negative rate of growth of – . %.
This was because of the influenza epidemic during – which killed about . million persons or % of the total population of the country (Visaria and Visaria : ). The growth rate of population substantially increased after independence from British rule going up to . % during - .
Since then although the annual growth rate has decreased it remains one of the highest in the developing world. Chart shows the comparative movement of the crude birth and death rates. The impact of the demographic transition phase is clearly seen in the graph where they begin to diverge from each other after the decade of to . Before , both death rates and birth rates were high, whereas, after this transitional moment the death rates fell sharply but the birth rate only fell slightly.
The principal reasons for the decline in the death rate after were increased levels of control over famines and epidemic diseases. The latter