On November 15, according to a subtle calculation, the world’s population touched eight billion. And who was the largest contributor to this figure? Who but… India, adding 177 million people out of the last billion born in the world. This ‘contribution’ would have been a matter of some embarrassment were it not for some good news that came alongside. The United Nations — no less — said on that day that India’s population growth appeared to be stabilising, adding that this showed that India’s national policies and health systems, including access to family planning services, were “working”.
India’s population growth is indeed stabilising, with the Total Fertility Rate, which is about the average number of children born per woman in India, having declined from 2.2 to 2.0 — taking India as a whole.
India ‘as a whole’ stands complimented.
But is India an un-differentiated ‘whole’? All of us know it is not. As does the world. The United Nations Population Fund has said 31 of India’s states and Union territories (comprising 69.7% of the population) have achieved fertility rates below the replacement level of 2.1 — a good statistic, showing the increased adoption of modern family planning methods. “This indicates,” the UN organisation has said, “significant improvements in access to family planning related information and services.” To that we must add, ‘in the States and Union Territories where the stabilisation has been established’.
The National Family Health Survey-5 tells us that Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Manipur and Meghalaya are above the replacement level, that is, they have not done that well. Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Assam, Gujarat, Haryana. Mizoram, Uttarakhand, Arunachal, Chhattisgarh, D&N Haveli, Kerala, Odisha, Telangana and Tamil Nadu are below 2.1 but above 1.7. They may be said to have done quite well. Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Nagaland, Tripura, Delhi, Punjab, West Bengal and Puducherry are below 1.7 but above 1.4. They may be said to have done very well. Chandigarh, J&K, Lakshadweep, A&N Islands, Goa, Ladakh and Sikkim are below 1.4. They have done extremely well. These ‘not that well’, ‘quite well’, ‘very well’, ‘extremely well’, are my expressions, not the NFHS’s. And a more scientifically calibrated description might be more appropriate.
But this column is not about our family planning performance as such. It is about something that comes from it, something that is worrisome.
Most political watchers are training their eyes on India two years from now — 2024 — when the next general elections are due. But population watchers are looking at four years from now — 2026 — when India’s electoral democracy is going to do a ‘handhold’ with India’s demography. A delimitation of the constituencies that will elect members of the Lok Sabha, following the population figures returned by the next decennial census, is to take place in 2026, as envisaged in Article 82 of our Constitution.
More people, the Constitution noted, should mean more MPs. This is sound logic. We ought not to have the same number of MPs — 543 — representing a vastly increased population in the Lok Sabha. Right. ‘Higher the number of people per constituency, lower the impact each voter has on Parliamentary representation’. Right. But life moves without the permission of logic.
And so…? A new nation-wide delimitation based on the latest population figures.
Such a population-based marking out or re-arrangement of constituencies will have the effect it is meant to have: giving more MPs to the states and Union territories that have that many people more. But the same exercise will give markedly less MPs to those that have held their numbers in some check. The word, ‘anomaly’, seems to have been made for this situation. ‘Piquant’, as well. Seeing that a delimitation based on census data would create a political anomaly and a civilisational piquancy, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, through the 42nd Amendment of the Constitution in 1976, froze the process. Prime Minister Vajpayee, through the 84th Amendment, froze it yet again. They were pragmatic. They had a sense that the India that is Bharat is about Bharat, not its most populous chunks. It is this double-extension that is to end in 2026.
Going by the census data for 2011 and projections made by the Technical Group formed by the National Commission on Population, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for 2011-36, Uttar Pradesh’s share in India’s population would see an increase by 1.74 percentage points, Bihar’s by 1.59 and Rajasthan’s by 1.17. Tamil Nadu’s share in India’s population would see a decline by 2.08 percentage points, undivided Andhra’s by 1.46 percentage points, Kerala’s by 1.36 percentage points, West Bengal’s by 1.03 percentage points.
Broadly speaking, the South, the East and Northeast will have lesser MPs in the Lok Sabha as a result of the 2026 delimitation than they have now. So will Maharashtra, Punjab, Delhi, among others, from the West and North. All of them for the reason that their awareness of the importance of family planning and access to methods for it have been good — an achievement of people-policy-partnership, verily a joint venture.
A delimitation exercise that adds electoral value to one set of states while depleting representative value to another is, to use a phrase coined by Amartya Sen in another context, ‘valuationally gross’. It cannot but be seen as an unfair punishment where there should be a deserved reward.
Demography and democracy must go hand in hand in a country which takes electoral representation seriously. In a Republic which sets store by federal principles, this becomes even more important.
There is another dimension to this, as pointed out in a recent symposium called in Delhi by the eminent media-personality, author and family welfare communicator par excellence, Rami Chhabra. The delimitation exercise is also going to, ipso facto, deepen the representational disadvantage faced by women, because it so happens that the population-controlling states are also those where the women of India have played a decisive role in that achievement and where their role in the process of elections and representation has been critical.
Delimitation is due; democracy calls for it.
Delimitation must not become debilitation; demography calls out to it.
Two alternatives are available to us:
One, another freeze, this time not for any specific period but till such time as all states achieve population stabilisation.
Two, demographic and statistical experts devise a mathematical model along the lines of the ‘Cambridge Compromise’ based on a mathematically equitable ‘formula’ for the apportionment of the seats of the European Parliament among the member states. That formula cannot be applied to our situation as such but needs to be studied so as to customise it for our needs. A fascinating new proposal made by Rami Chhabra is for the re-introduction of double-member constituencies which, if twinned to the proposals for a percentage increase in reservation of seats for women, will give us two ‘hits’ — no loss of MP numbers plus gain in women’s representation.
The population-stabilising states of India that is Bharat must continue to enrich our legislative and parliamentary processes as they have been doing with no penalties having to be paid for their sense of responsibility as to population-prudence. And with the Indian woman’s voice being heard loud and clear, not above but on a par with the others.
