Demographic Diversity in Districts of India

Contributed by National Academy of Statistical Administration, India

Background

Decentralised, district-based approach to population and planning.

Demographic and development diversity across the districts is well known.

exogenous variables and policy and programme interventions affect demographic and development situation differentially across the districts.

Objectives

Analysis of demographic diversity across 640 districts of India on the basis of provisional data of the 2011 population census.

How demographic diversity across districts contributes to demographic diversity across states.

Policy and programme implications of demographic diversity across districts.

Diversity Index

Diversity is measured on a two-dimensional scale The dimension of intensiveness The dimension of extensiveness

Intensity is measured in terms of differentials and concentration; differentials are the most basic.

Extensiveness is the ratio of the population of the district to the population of the country.

Diversity Index

The index of the intensity of diversity is defined as

Idc(v) = log(Vd/Vc) The index of extensiveness is

defined asEdc = Pd/Pc

The index of diversity is defined asDdc(v) = Edc*(Idc(v))2

Diversity Index

The Diversity Index is always positive. The limiting value is zero meaning no diversity.

The higher is the index, the larger is the diversity.

It is a fuller measure of diversity as it takes into account the relative size of the population.

It can be decomposed.

Data and Variables

Provisional figures of 2011 population census.

The following 7 variables can be estimated:1. Population density2. Age composition index (P0-6/P)

3. Age composition index (P0-6/P7+)

4. Population sex ratio5. Child sex ratio6. Fertility index (P0-6/F7+)

Results

All the six variables vary widely across the districts.

The pattern of distribution is different for different variables.

The distribution of population density is highly skewed with a very high value of kurtosis.

In 11 districts, population density is more than 10 thousand persons per sq km.

Results

District Mumbai in Maharashtra has the highest population density in the country – more than 50 thousand per sq km.

In all districts of Delhi, population density is more than 3500 per sq km.

The distribution of the index of age composition and the index of fertility is very similar across districts.

Results

The skewness in the distribution of the two variables across districts is positive but not very large.

The Kurtosis is negative meaning that there is no district with exceptionally high value of these indexes.

The distribution of districts by sex ratio has been found to be negatively skewed.

Results

There are some districts with extremely low proportion of females to males.

In 9 districts, the sex ratio is less than 800 females for every 1000 males.

In Daman and Diu, there are only 533 females for every 1000 males.

In 101 districts, females outnumbered males at the 2011 population census.

Results

The distribution of child sex ratio is more sharply negatively skewed than the population sex ratio.

There are however only 6 districts where the child sex ratio is estimated to be less than 800. Four of these 6 districts are in Haryana.

There are only three districts where female children outnumbered males children.

Results

The distribution of the sex ratio of the population aged 7 years and above is very much similar to the sex ratio of the total population.

In Daman and Diu, there are less than 500 females 7+ for every 1000 males 7+.

In 117 districts, females outnumber males in this age group with Mahe leading the list.

Results

The district level diversity is the highest in case of population density but lowest in case of the sex ratio of the population aged 0-6 years.

The kernel density plots confirm this observation. These plots are always positively skewed because the diversity index used in the present analysis is by definition always positive.

Results

Most of the demographic diversity is the result of extreme situation in only a few districts.

Only 10 per cent of the districts account for 75 per cent of the diversity in population density. 52 per cent of the diversity in age structure. 55 per cent of the diversity in population sex ratio. 49 per cent of the diversity in child sex ratio. 66 per cent of the diversity in sex ratio 7+. 49 per cent of the diversity in fertility index.

Results

In case of population density, within state variation accounts for 52 per cent of the total inter-district diversity in the country.

In case of fertility index more than 71 per cent of the diversity is accounted by between state variations.

Between state component is larger than within state component in five variables.

Conclusions

Most of the demographic diversity is the result of the demographic situation in a few districts of the country.

This observation bears significance in the context of the persistence of social, economic, cultural and ecological diversity of the country.

Despite this diversity, the demographic situation is similar in most of the districts.

Conclusions

In general, the inter-district diversity is largely the result of the diversity across states. Within states, the diversity across the districts is relatively low.

Demographic diversity across states in India is well known.

Provisional results of 2011 population census confirm that this diversity continue to persist.

Thank You