INDIAN POPULATION

India is the second most populated country in the world with nearly a fifth of the world's population. According to the 2019 revision of the World Population Prospects[1][2] population stood at 1,352,642,280.During 1975–2010, the population doubled to 1.2 billion. The Indian population reached the billion mark in 1998. India is projected to be the world's most populous country by 2024,[4] surpassing the population of China. It is expected to become the first political entity in history to be home to more than 1.5 billion people by 2030, and its population is set to reach 1.7 billion by 2050.[5][6] Its population growth rate is 1.13%, ranking 112th in the world in 2017.[7]India has more than 50% of its population below the age of 25 and more than 65% below the age of 35. It is expected that, in 2020, the average age of an Indian will be 29 years, compared to 37 for China and 48 for Japan; and, by 2030, India's dependency ratio should be just over 0.4.[8]India has more than two thousand ethnic groups,[9] and every major religion is represented, as are four major families of languages (Indo-European, Dravidian, Austroasiatic and Sino-Tibetan languages) as well as two language isolates (the Nihali language[10] spoken in parts of Maharashtra and the Burushaski language spoken in parts of Jammu and Kashmir (Kashmir).Further complexity is lent by the great variation that occurs across this population on social parameters such as income and education. Only the continent of Africa exceeds the linguistic, genetic and cultural diversity of the nation of India.[11]The sex ratio is 944 females for 1000 males (2016) (940 per 1000 in 2011[12]). This ratio has been showing an upwards trend for the last two decades after a continuous decline in the last century.


The population grew from the South Asian Stone Age in 10,000 BC to the Maurya Empire in 200 BC at a steadily increasing growth rate,[22] before population growth slowed down in the classical era up to 500 AD, and then became largely stagnant during the early medieval era up to 1000 AD.[14][16] The population growth rate then increased in the late medieval era (during the Delhi Sultanate) from 1000 to 1500.[14][16]
India's population growth rate under the Mughal Empire (16th–18th centuries) was higher than during any previous period in Indian history.[22][23][16] Under the Mughal Empire, India experienced an unprecedented economic and demographic upsurge,[22] due to Mughal agrarian reforms that intensified agricultural production,[24] proto-industrialization[25] that established India as the most important centre of manufacturing in international trade,[26] and a relatively high degree of urbanisation for its time;[27] 15% of the population lived in urban centres, higher than the percentage of the population in 19th-century British India[27] and contemporary Europe[27] up until the 19th century.[28]
Under the reign of Akbar (reigned 1556–1605) in 1600, the Mughal Empire's urban population was up to 17 million people, larger than the urban population in Europe.[29] By 1700, Mughal India had an urban population of 23 million people, larger than British India's urban population of 22.3 million in 1871.[30] Nizamuddin Ahmad (1551–1621) reported that, under Akbar's reign, Mughal India had 120 large cities and 3,200 townships.[27] A number of cities in India had a population between a quarter-million and half-million people,[27] with larger cities including Agra (in Agra Subah) with up to 800,000 people[31] and Dhaka (in Bengal Subah) with over 1 million people.[32] Mughal India also had a large number of villages, with 455,698 villages by the time of Aurangzeb (reigned 1658–1707).[29]
In the early 18th century, the average life expectancy in Mughal India was 35 years.[33] In comparison, the average life expectancy for several European nations in the 18th century were 34 years in early modern England, up to 30 years in France, and about 25 years in Prussia.[34]

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