Any Current Problems of India Essay

Any Current Problems of India

The Problem and the Reasons—

We are a country of over a billion people and have 30 million more mouths to feed every year. There are three reasons for this fast growth in population : (a) advances in medical science has lowered death rate significantly, (b) family planning efforts could not bring down birth rate at the required pace, and (c) immigration from across the borders has continued unabated. There are about 200 million people in the country.

Population can be an Asset—

Population growth can be an asset with more minds to think, provided we are able to cope with more mouths to feed, more bodies to keep healthy and more brains to train.

So far our agricultural growth has been able to sustain the strain but if the population goes on increasing at the current rate, things will go out of hand.

The Pattern of Growth—

Now, let's look at the pattern of population growth. It is growing faster in the rural areas resulting in not only bigger landless families forcing migration to towns, increasing the numbers of slum-dwellers but also dividing land-holdings into unviable entities. Both these result in lowering the already low standards of living, healthcare and education.

As regards more hands to work, we haven't got the necessary infrastructure—good roads, railway lines and electric power—for faster industrial growth. As far electric power is concerned, we are not even in a position to meet domestic requirements.

The Remedy—

Hence, what we urgently need is (a) to enforce small family norms on all communities, both urban and rural, (b) take effective steps not only to check immigration across the borders but also to identify illegal immigrants and repatriate them to their own countries, and (c) use national resources judiciously to create better infrastructure for industrial growth.