India begins headcount of its 1.2 Billion population - General news

New Delhi: An estimated 2.7 million officials fanned out across the country Wednesday to begin the gigantic exercise of headcounting India's estimated 1.2 billion population, the world's second largest after China.

The decadal exercise, which will be the 15th headcount of India's population since 1872, is undertaken to create a database on demography, economic activity, literacy and education, housing and household amenities, urbanisation, fertility and mortality, social structure, language, religion and migration.

The nationwide exercise, which will continue over the next three weeks, began as a group of officials, called enumerators, visited President Pratibha Patil at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential palace.

Census enumerator Rita collected information on a number of characteristics about the president's household. Patil signed off on a 29-point questionnaire listing income, religion, education, access to basic utilities and other topics. A similar form will be filled by every citizen of the country through Feb 28.

Speaking after her enumeration, the president asked everyone to "wholeheartedly" take part in the census, considering it "as a national duty".

Home Minister P. Chidambaram, Minister of State for Home Affairs Gurudas Kamat, Census Commissioner C. Chandramouli and Director Census Operation (Delhi) Varsha Joshi were present at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

Vice President Hamid Ansari, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress party chief Sonia Gandhi also provided the details about their respective households to the enumerators.

The family members of governors and chief ministers were among those enumerated on the first day of the second phase.

A similar exercise would be carried out in more than 7,000 towns and 600,000 villages across the country, including in troubled Jammu and Kashmir, the far-flung northeast and areas by Maoist insurgency in east and central India.

According to officials, around 100,000 enumerators and supervisors have been appointed in the eight northeastern states. Soldiers and paramilitary troopers have been engaged as enumerators in their respective camps and barracks.

In Jammu and Kashmir, even separatist leaders have supported the exercise, urging the people to provide full details to census officials. The first phase of the exercise was held from July 15 to Sep 30 last year, which passed off peacefully. The state had missed on the exercise in 1991 when insurgency was at its peak.

In Orissa, the population count began with the enumeration of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. The chief minister also flagged off a publicity van, which will travel through various parts of the state during the second phase that will conclude Feb 28, an official said.

The first round of houselisting and collecting housing data for Census-2011 was completed from April to September last year.

The houselisting is done because there is no complete address system in India and each and every structure is being listed so that when the enumerators come for headcounting, they know exactly where to go, officials said.

In the second phase, enumerators will ask questions on literacy, work status, marital status, languages spoken, mode of transport and number of children.

On the last day of the survey, enumerators will count the homeless on the streets across India. And between March 1 and 5, they will compile the data for the entire population.

New features added to the 2011 census include revised questions on the institutional household, new category in gender parameter for transgenders, a code for separated and divorced, new codes under status of school attendance and a separate code included under non-economic activity.

Census 2011 has also introduced new initiatives to sensitise school students about census operations. For the first time, officials are stepping beyond the demographics and economic activity and would collect details like ownership of mobile phones, computers, internet access, and availability of treated or untreated drinking water.

The census is the only source of credible data base in India that the government uses to formulate its policies.

Source: India begins headcount of its 1.2 Billion population - General news

World's baby No. 7 billion could be born in UP

In the midst of all the handwringing over population explosion in the country, the Indian government might miss preparing for a global record-setting event — the birth of the baby that would take the population of planet earth to the seven billion mark.

The momentous birth is projected to happen towards the October or November. But what's that got to do with India? Well, we just happen to be the country with by far the highest number of babies born every minute at 51. That means the probability of Baby 7 Billion being an Indian is higher than for any other nationality. In fact, Uttar Pradesh alone has about 11 babies born every minute a figure that no nation other than China exceeds and Nigeria matches.

Actually, the event may even happen as late as early or mid-2012 depending on which person or organization`s estimates you take as valid. After all, there is no agreement even on when exactly the six billion mark was crossed. While the UN said its calculations showed that the six billion figure was reached on October 12, 1999, the US Census Bureau said it was reached on July 22, 1999. The quibbling over the exact date seems quite pointless considering the fact that 267 babies are estimated to be born every minute in the world, almost a fifth of them in India.

With even the date of the event being in question, clearly deciding on exactly which birth tips the scales is an arbitrary process. How does one decide which out of the 16,000 babies born each hour or 384,000 babies born each day becomes the record-breaking seven billionth baby?

The UN had chosen Adnan Nevic born in Sarajevo, Bosnia on October 12, 1999 as the symbolic six billionth baby. UN officials insisted that there was no special significance in the choice of Sarajevo. Similarly, Matej Gaspar born in Zagreb, Yugoslavia on July 11, 1987 was designated the five billionth baby.

If it's as random as that, don't bet on a UP-ite or indeed an Indian baby being conferred the title this time round. The depressing news, of course, is if the baby is born in UP, the chances of he or she celebrating a fifth birthday will be slim as the state has the dubious distinction of having the highest under-five mortality in the country - 96.4 per 1,000 much higher than the national figure of 74.3 per 1000.

Whichever baby gets chosen as the symbolic seven billionth, the concern is about the kind of world that awaits these children. As the date to cross the next billion draws closer, there is panic about whether there will be enough food, water and energy for the billions being added too quickly and whether the earth can support them. Between now and 2050, virtually all population growth will take place in the Low Development Countries. This paints a grim picture of the future of the millions who will be born in some of the poorest families in the world.

After taking about 250,000 years to reach the first billion sometime around 1800, humanity has been increasing its pace of growth rapidly. In just 127 years, the human population crossed the next billion in 1927 and then accelerated further, reaching the next billion within 33 years in 1960. It then raced to touch four billion in 1974. Since then, the pace has not been increasing as fast, as it touched five billion 13 years later in 1987 and six billion 12 years later in 1999. Now, another 12 years later, it is expected to touch seven billion.

Source:-http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Worlds-baby-No-7-billion-could-be-born-in-UP/articleshow/7349881.cms