File photo of Baba Ramdev with Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Aditiyanath during Yog Mahotsav in Lucknow, March 29, 2017. (Nand Kumar/PTI)

India is bursting at the seams with its population touching an astonishingly high figure of 1,367,458,102, as of June 1, 2019, according to the most recent United Nations (UN) estimates, making it 17.74 per cent of total world population.

As the seventh largest in the world in terms of area, the nation is second only to another Asian country, China that has actively adopted strict birth control policies since 1970 and stands at the 1.4 billion demographic mark.

The report states that if India chugged along its current rate of population increase which is 1.17 per cent (2017 estimate), it will most likely unseat China by 2024, adding further that while China’s is expected to peak in 2029 at 1.44 billion before it starts declining, Indian population will peak in the 2060s.

No nation, however developed, has the capacity to sustain an infinitely sized of a population especially when it outstrips the availability of natural resources that is a given finite.

Elaborating on paucity of resources, India is at a critical juncture as it is already facing domestic water struggles, and lack of adequate infrastructure, public health support, and transportation, and political manifestos taking of providing even the bare minimum essentials of a basic standard of living to all its citizens are likened to promising the moon.

There is no plan in the works on how the government agencies will handle the challenges of providing basic services to a future influx of 830 million migrants to Indian cities, as UN experts.

Malnutrition and declining national health will check whatever advances the aspirational nation may make and halt its march to being a super power.

Among a plethora of factors, the burden of burgeoning population has led to the country slipping by three positions from a year earlier to 103rdrank among 119 countries on the Global Hunger Index.

It has also been listed with 45 more nations to have serious levels of hunger and its food demand is expected to double by 2050.

In the midst of these figures and a grim reality should one perceive Yoga Guru Baba Ramdev’s statement, “India’s population should not be more than 1.5 billion in the next 50 years as we are not prepared or ready to bear more than that. This is only possible when the government makes a law that third child would not be allowed to vote, neither contest election nor he/she enjoys any type of privileges and facilities given by the government…Then people will not give birth to more children, no matter which religion they belong to.”

Though the utterances sound preposterous, they appear to have generated much deserved public debate for a variety of reasons, such as the need, immediacy, finer details and probable fall outs of a more comprehensive population policy than the mere slogan, “Hum Do, Humare Do” (We two, ours two), first pronounced by Sanjay Gandhi during the infamous Emergency Period (1975-1977).

On comparable terms India’s population density, 382 per sq km, ranks higher than all developed countries or even that of China or Pakistan, with a population density at 152 per sq km and 251 sq km respectively, but is lower only to that of Bangladesh (1,120 per sq km).

According to the National Family Planning Health Surveys 3 &4, though India’s fertility rate did come down 18.7 per cent, from 2.68 (2003-05) to 2.18 (2013-2015), on account of factors like literacy, urbanization, industrialization modern communication and women’s status, the country’s population has been on the rise and leads the world in rate of increase in population.

Interestingly the fall in fertility rate was witnessed across all religious groups putting at rest notions of higher birth rates amongst Muslims.

However, even if population size is impacted by mortality and education so is it subjected to “population momentum” that lays primacy on the number of reproductive women present in a population.

Population momentum is the ratio of the size of the population at that new equilibrium level to the size of the initial population and is a consequence of demographic transition.

In India’s case the number of children (0-5 age group) peaked in 2007, before it started to decline, and those under 15 years of age peaked in 2011, yet there have been discernible increases in population that is expected to continue for three decades more as pre-childbearing age group enters childbearing age category.

Another valid observation that must dictate the formulation of social policies is that southern states and Maharashtra have replacement rates while some are still on a huge population expansive mode, obviating the need for different state driven social policies tailor made to meet individual provincial requirements.

Responding to a plea filed by advocate Ashwini Upadhaya, the Delhi High Court issued a notice to the centre to inform the court of government’s action on assessing the feasibility of 24threcommendation of National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution on population control.

The petitioner’s contention elaborates that “population explosion” is the root cause of half of the problems of the country, ranging from crunch in land, water, “roti, kapra, makan” (bread, clothing, house), wealth, employment, food, diet, to pollution, corruption, crimes against females, overcrowding in transportation, public institutions, roads, courts, theft, dacoity, separatism, stone pelting, to name a few, and therefore necessitates an aggressive implementation of two-child norm, compliance of which should be linked to criteria to avail government jobs, subsidies, several statutory rights such as the right to vote, right to contest, right to property, right to free shelter and right to free legal aid.

Upadhyay’s findings are derived from study of all criminals in Dasna Jail of Ghaziabad, conclusions of which are that third child resorted to crime, when the parents had not adhered to the two-child policy.

What needs to be borne in mind is that in a society that prefers a male child, any birth control policy may present the proverbial pitfalls — abandoning/neglect of the girl child, sex-selective abortions, gender imbalances, desertion and bigamy, and hence any policy needs to incorporate expends in spreading of awareness and effectuation in true earnestness after the newly designated Parliamentarians have considered and consulted every party on every minute detail of it.