The Present · वर्तमान · The Indian Census, 1881

–2011

the year · वर्ष the first census

1881

total India — million souls

Fig. 1 Share of the all-India total, by region — per cent —

drag the census year वर्ष सरकाएँ

1881

1921

1951

1981

2011

A bargain, and its expiry date

The Constitution promised a redraw every ten years. हर दशक का वादा

Articles 81 & 82 instructed Parliament to re-allot Lok Sabha seats after each census, so that no vote weighed more than another. In 1976, mid-Emergency, with the South's family-planning drive working and the North's faltering, Mrs Gandhi's government passed the 42nd Amendment and froze the allocation at 1971 figures. In 2001, the Vajpayee NDA passed the 84th Amendment and extended the freeze to the first census taken after 2026. The decadal promise is now half a century overdue.

1976 · 42nd Amdt. · freeze begins ◇ 2001 · 84th Amdt. · extended to 2026 ◇ read the full history →

Part the Second

ii. Why redraw क्यों पुनर्रचना

Three figures follow. When each region's growth peaked, how many people now answer to a single Lok Sabha seat, and how far each state now sits from the population behind it.

Fig. 2 When each region's engine peaked — % growth per decade —

दर्ज़ दशकीय वृद्धि · Growth per decade, calculated against the previous census. South's S-curve bends downward a full twenty years before North's does.

Fig. 3 One seat, how many citizens — lakh of people per Lok Sabha seat, 2011 —

27.4L One Rajasthan MP speaks for 27.4 lakh citizens.

0.6L One Lakshadweep MP speaks for 0.6 lakh. A 43× gap without leaving the map.

Dashed vermilion line marks 14.25 lakh — India's 2011 population divided by a hypothetical 850 seats, i.e. the one-seat-one-size ideal.

Fig. 4 The freeze penalty — share of population minus share of seats, by state, 2011 —

+ 1.77pp Uttar Pradesh is the most under-seated state — 1.77 percentage points of the country's population, missing from its share of the House.

◇

− 1.22pp Tamil Nadu sits 1.22 pp above its population share — a small-state bonus the 1971 freeze has held in place.

ठहराव-दंड · Each bar shows how far a state's share of India's population exceeds (right) or falls below (left) its share of the Lok Sabha. Positive bars are the argument for redrawing; negative bars are the bargain currently in place.

iii. Dramatis personae चार क्षेत्र

East

पूर्व

West Bengal, Odisha

West

पश्चिम

Gujarat, Maharashtra

North (Hindi belt)

उत्तर

UP, Bihar, MP, Rajasthan, Haryana, HP, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Delhi

South

दक्षिण

Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh (incl. Telangana)

Set in Fraunces & Tiro Devanagari Hindi ◇ Composed on cream