Fertility Levels and Trends in India, 1951-81

Abstract

India, the second most populous country in the world, is experiencing the early stages of fertility transition. The unprecedented acceleration in the rate of growth of India's population, sparked off by declining mortality as early as 1921, has finally been arrested, as revealed by the figures from the 1981 census. It is beyond doubt that a significant contribution to this phenomenon lately has been from declining fertility, of which there is ample cumulative evidence. The extent of the decline, however, is not precisely known at either the national or subnational level. Using additional data from the 1981 census that were recently released, this paper provides estimates of fertility in India over time, with a new method based essentially on the census data. The paper attempts to estimate recent fertility as well as to give a long-term uniform perspective on fertility change in India. I The measures of fertility used are the gross reproduction rate (GRR), the total fertility rate (TFR), the intrinsic birth rate (IBR), and the crude birth rate (CBR). At the national level, fertility is measured at quinquennial time intervals for the three decades from 1951 to 1981. India's cultural diversity is reflected in substantial demographic variation across the nation. Therefore, fertility levels and trends are also estimated by urban-rural residence and for the 14 most populous states of India for the last two decades. As a byproduct, the analysis yields estimates of the crude death rate for India as a whole from 1951 to 1981. The paper also presents an appropriate method for estimating fertility levels and trends at national and subnational levels from census data for countries with deficient population and vital statistics.

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