Poverty and Population Growth in India: The Myth and the Reality

Abstract

Indias population has doubled 2.3 times between 1947 and 1988 despite the governments population policy countrywide family planning and many vasectomy campaigns. Some intelligentsia government officials and even some environmentalists now consider overpopulation as secondary to economic development. Many express faith in science and technology to bring about the level of development needed to raise living standards to the point oof affecting population growth but few know what level that is. About 40% of the population have access to public distribution of foodgrains but not enough money to buy what is needed. These same people were originally self sufficient farmers but population growth along with the subsequent reduction in the quality and size of land holdings and degradation of pastures have forced poverty and malnutrition upon them. The government assumed that the criteria of the monetary economy can be applied to the natural economy of the rural areas where most of the populations subsistence is still organized around the noncash collection of local materials for family consumption. As the population grows the demand for these materials begins to exceed sustainable yields and the people then need money to supplement the deficiency. In addition to the effect of overpopulation on the lands sustainability other major enviornmental problems of India include farming on submarginal land slash and burn agriculture deforestation overgrazing a huge increase in livestock and the effects of poorly planned and badly implemented huge irrigation projects. Political power groups senior administrators and influential intelligentsia must put aside their pride in their new found national pride in industrial achievement and accept the fact that India is already overpopulation and the land is crumbling beneath the burden.