INDIA'S POPULATION

SIR,—I read with great interest and satisfaction Mr. J. D. Jenkins's letter of October 16th, 1944, published in your paper of November loth, 1944. This letter is almost very late, the reason being that we in India get the copy of our Spectator after a couple of months. The so-called population problem of India has attracted much attention since the last depression and it has come to the forefront with Dr. R. K. Mukerjee's Food for Four Hundred Millions and 'Dr. Gyan Chand's India's Teeming Millions. There has been a growing belief that India's food production is not keeping pace with the growth of her,copulation. It is said that Indian population has a. tendency to increase by five millions per annum without any restriction. Mr. J. D. Jenkins, in his letter, has accepted that the increase in the Indian population for the last fifty years is indeed very small when compared to the increase. in other countries during the same period. But he seems to be suspicious of the actual growth of population in relation to food supply.

An investigation of the growth of population and food supply of India reveals that food supply has not lagged behind, it has gone forward.

1. Requirements of the people.

Various standards of dietetic requirements have been formulated by various nationalities—Starling, the notable sociologist, has assigned 3,177 calories to the Italians, 3,22o calories to the French, and 3,300 calories to the British, while East claims 3,500 calories for the Americans. But we, in. India, shall have to discard these Anglo-French-American standards, and shall have to form our own standard. India should profit from the example of Japan (even if she be an enemy), which, in spite of a low and a rice standard, has risen to prominence.

Nichols has estimated that an average agricultural labourer in the tropics requires about 2,200 calories per day.

At the World Population Conference (Geneva, 1927) M. Henri Brenier gave the calorie requirements for hot climates for a male weighing about. no lb. (55 kilo.) to be 1,650 calories (Proceedings, London, p. 93). But as an average Indian is an agricultural labourer, we shall have to raise this figure a little.

Dr. Aykroyd of Coonoor is of opinion that the figure should be somewhere between 2,400 and 2,600. But this is rather too high a figure.

It should lie somewhere between 1,65o (Brenier) and 2,200 (Nichols). The moderate figure, however, seems to be 2,000 calories.

2. The supply.

The average net supply of food per head (per day) of population (in cwts.) is: Total, 3.23 ; Rice, 1.61 ; Wheat, 0.55.

Sir John Russell in his report (1937) gives this table:

PRODUCTION OF GRAINS PER HEAD

Total grains Nitrogen Province. in oz. in grams.

Assam . ....... . I8 7 Bengal 19 7 Bihar and Orissa 24 II Bombay 29 Central Provinces 3o 15

Madras 22 I I Punjab 21 12 United Provinces 22 13 According to this authority the average foodstuffs available in India is about 22 oz. per head per day, which makes about 2,000 or 2,200 calories.

Below I give the indices of population and food supply, with 5909-10 to 1913-14 as base, taking the indices to be too in both the cases. (The averages have been taken for the months of the years.) Years. Population.

All crops. Food crops.

Non-food crops.

1921-22 ... 100 109 125

94

1928-29 ... 103 138 123

154

1931-32

... 114

149 133 ' • 166 1932-33 ... 117 127

134

121

Thus we see that the Indian food supply has not decreased, it has rather increased—it has left population far behind. The question of questions that we are to face then is " Why this starvation? " and " Why this hue and cry of over-population?" The obvious reply that I and any other person will give is that there is so much mal-distribution. We want, or rather require, an equitable distribution of foodstuffs. I hope that the public will examine this state of affairs and be not misled by any misunderstanding whatsoever.—I am, yours, &c.,

DHARMA BHANU SRIVASTAVA.

Warden's Residence, D.A.-V. College Hostel, Lahore, India. January loth, 1945.