Which of the following statements is true for India’s demography and population?
A. Famines were caused by high levels of continuing poverty and malnutrition.
B. Unlike the death rate, the birth rate has not registered a sharp fall.
C. Programmes for mass vaccination, and efforts to improve sanitation helped to control epidemics.
D. Prosperity does not influence family size.
Choose the correct answer from the options given below:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 2
The correct answer is Option (2) → A, B and C only
A. Famines were caused by high levels of continuing poverty and malnutrition. Correct. Poverty and malnutrition in a region at the mercy of the rains made famines recur.
B. Unlike the death rate, the birth rate has not registered a sharp fall. Correct. The birth rate is a sociocultural phenomenon that is slow to change.
C. Programmes for mass vaccination, and efforts to improve sanitation helped to control epidemics. Correct. Better medical cures, vaccination and sanitation brought epidemics under control.
D. Prosperity does not influence family size. Incorrect. Increased prosperity exerts a strong downward pull on the birth rate, so family size falls.
NCERT (2025-26): “2.2 Size and Growth of India’s Population … Famines were caused by high levels of continuing poverty and malnutrition in an agroclimatic environment that was very vulnerable to variations in rainfall. Lack of adequate means of transportation and communication as well as inadequate efforts on the part of the state were some of the factors responsible for famines. However, as scholars like Amartya Sen and others have shown, famines were not necessarily due to fall in foodgrains production; they were also caused by a ‘failure of entitlements’, or the inability of people to buy or otherwise obtain food. Substantial improvements in the productivity of Indian agriculture (specially through the expansion of irrigation); improved means of communication; and more vigorous relief and preventive measures by the state have all helped to drastically reduce deaths from famine. Nevertheless, starvation deaths are still reported from some backward regions of the country. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act is the latest state initiative to tackle the problem of hunger and starvation in rural areas. Unlike the death rate, the birth rate has not registered a sharp fall. This is because the birth rate is a sociocultural phenomenon that is relatively slow to change. By and large, increased levels of prosperity exert a strong downward pull on the birth rate. Once infant mortality rates decline, and there is an overall increase in the levels of education and awareness, family size begins to fall.…” |