India is on the verge of reaching the one billion population mark. This nation which each year adds more people to the world than any other will officially top one billion next year, according to demographers.
In coming days, a huge population clock in the capital, Delhi, is to be readjusted in accordance with this latest projection. The digital billboard clock, calibrated according to census information from 1991, has already reached the one billion mark. Too soon, says the Indian government. Recent mortality and fertility data indicate a slight downturn in population growth. The big day is now set for May 11th, 2000.
Only China has more people, but India is catching up fast. Present projections indicate that India will have overtaken China in four decades. India's population is growing at 15 million people per year. To get a graphic illustration of just how fast its numbers are increasing, log on to the Census of India website (www.censusindia.net) and look at the speed with which the hands on the population clock turn. A baby is born every two seconds.
India's population over the past five years has been growing at a rate of 1.6 per cent a year. This shows a slight slowdown. Unpublished Indian government figures show that in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, the country's most populous, the total fertility rate - the number of children for every woman in the reproductive age bracket - has dropped from an anticipated 4.8 to 4. Not much of a drop, you might think, but demographers here are getting excited.
The reason for the downturn is not clear. Some experts have suggested that a boom in abortions could be behind it. Rising female foeticide is one of modern India's many frightening realities.
"The fact that India is reaching the one billion mark is a real cause for concern," said Mr Michael Vlassoff, India representative of the United Nations Population Fund. "India had the first official family planning programme of any developing country but its population control policies have repeatedly failed the people."
These sentiments are echoed in a report by the Worldwatch Institute, an independent research organisation in Washington DC, which says that the birth of the one billionth Indian is "not a cause for celebration".
India, declares the report, "has a nuclear arsenal capable of protecting the largest concentration of impoverished citizens on Earth". The report says that half of India's adults are illiterate, more than half of its children are undernourished and a third live below the poverty line.
The rapid increase in population is placing unbearable pressure on the country's resources. In the last half-century, India has been able to triple its grain harvest, but food production has barely kept up with population.
Food production is also threatened by falling water tables. According to some estimates, India is using its underground water reserves twice as fast as they are being replaced. By sinking wells (eight million so far) and using pumps, Indians farmers are sucking the life out of the land.
Poverty rates are declining, but the actual number of people living in poverty continues to rise. The annual per-capita income in India, according to the World Bank, is only £230.
Latest UNFPA figures show that the number of births among teenage women India is especially high (112 per 1,000 in the 15-19 age bracket) and that contraceptive prevalence is low.
Among the rural population, says a recent report by the UN Development Programme, "a meagre 43 per cent of households have domestic lighting [and] 25 per cent have access to tap water".
However, it is not the countryside but the cities which should cause greatest concern, according to one leading sociologist.
"Many of our major cities are in a state of collapse with transport breakdowns, air pollution, health epidemics, water shortages and power supply problems. This is now accepted as a normal state of affairs in India," said Mr Shiv Visvanathan of the Centre for Study of Developing Societies.
Most observers agree that unless something is done to curb the population growth and improve the lives of its people, much of Indian society will sink under the weight of problems facing it.