Patna,(BiharTimes): Bihar has the highest number of population under 14 to be followed by Uttar Pradesh.
According to the data released by the office of the Census Commissioner on Friday while India, as a whole has 31 per cent of its population under the age of 14, the corresponding figure for Bihar is 40.1 per cent and for UP is 35.69 per cent.
Experts are of the view that this is the highest such proportion not for any State, but possibly even for the world.
While India has a whopping 767.5 million in the working age group, the proportion of working age population varies from a high of 74.3 per cent in Daman and Diu, to a low of 55 per cent in Bihar.
So, while the rest of the country has lowered the proportion of its population that is under 14, for Bihar, this proportion has increased by over 10 percentage points since 2001. This makes it the only State that has added more persons under the age of 14 than over the age of 60.
The data show that developed States are reaching their peak working age (between 15 and 59) populations, and are ageing faster than the rest of the country. Tamil Nadu, with over 65 per cent, currently has the highest proportion of its people in the working age population.
Kerala is on the verge of the long-expected beginning of the decline in its working population; while the absolute number of people in this state between the ages of 15 and 59 has increased slightly, its proportion to the State’s whole population has declined slightly.
Thus it is the children from Bihar and UP, who will form the bulk of the workforce of the future. This will have impact on various socio-economic aspects––for example migration pattern, condition of education and health sector etc in these two states.
The Centre as well as both these states will have to chalk out its policy in accordance with the rise in this upcoming population.
Census Commissioner C Chandramouli said that skill development is going to be make or break for India’s demographic dividend to pay off.
While these two northern states will have large young population southern states have started facing the problem of ageing.
The data also shows that while India as a whole has 8.5 per cent of its population over 60, Tamil Nadu and Kerala have older populations.
About 13 per cent of Kerala is over the age of 60, a level comparable with those of northern European countries.
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