All exercise questions (and the in-text questions and activities asked within the chapter) from the NCERT textbook India: People and Economy, Chapter 1, “Population: Distribution, Density, Growth and Composition”, exactly as the English edition prints them, with a full model answer for each. Try your own answer first, then check it against this one.
1 Choose the right answer of the following from the given options
Q. India’s population as per 2011 census is:
(a) 1028 million (b) 3182 million (c) 3287 million (d) 1210 million
Answer: (d) 1210 million. The chapter opens by stating that India is the second most populous country after China, with its total population of 1,210 million (2011).
Q. Which one of the following states has the highest density of population in India?
(a) West Bengal (b) Kerala (c) Uttar Pradesh (d) Bihar
Answer: (d) Bihar. The chapter’s own figures for 2011 give Bihar a density of 1,102 persons per sq km, the highest of the four states listed here (West Bengal 1,029, Kerala 859, Uttar Pradesh 828).
Q. Which one of the following states has the highest proportion of urban population in India according to 2011 Census?
(a) Tamil Nadu (b) Maharashtra (c) Kerala (d) Goa
Answer: (d) Goa. The chapter itself only asks the reader to “compare the data of Appendix (iii)” for this, without printing the Appendix’s figures in the running text. By the same published Census 2011 state-wise urban-population data the Appendix draws on, Goa has the highest share of urban population among Indian states (about 62%), ahead of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra.
Q. Which one of the following is the largest linguistic group of India?
(a) Sino-Tibetan (b) Indo-Aryan (c) Austric (d) Dravidian
Answer: (b) Indo-Aryan. Table 1.2 gives the Indo-European (Aryan) family a 73% share, well ahead of Dravidian (20%), Austric (1.38%) and Sino-Tibetan (0.85%).
2 Answer the following questions in about 30 words
Q. Very hot and dry and very cold and wet regions of India have low density of population. In this light, explain the role of climate on the distribution of population.
Answer: Climate, along with terrain and availability of water, largely determines population distribution. Areas with an extreme or difficult climate, whether very hot and dry or very cold and wet, are less habitable and less suited to agriculture, so they attract and support fewer people than regions with a moderate, favourable climate.
Q. Which states have large rural population in India? Give one reason for such large rural population.
Answer: The chapter names Himachal Pradesh and Bihar as states with a very high percentage of rural population. One reason is that the relative degree of urbanisation and the extent of rural-urban migration in a state regulate how much of its population stays concentrated in villages rather than moving to towns.
Q. Why do some states of India have higher rates of work participation than others?
Answer: The work participation rate tends to be higher in areas with lower levels of economic development, because a larger number of manual workers are needed there to carry out subsistence or near-subsistence economic activities.
Q. “‘The agricultural sector has the largest share of Indian workers.’ – Explain.”
Answer: About 54.6 per cent of India’s total working population (2011) are cultivators and agricultural labourers, far more than the 3.8 per cent in household industries or the 41.6 per cent in other (non-agricultural) work, so agriculture remains the single largest employer, even though its share has been falling, from 58.2 per cent in 2001 to 54.6 per cent in 2011.
3 Answer the following questions in about 150 words
Q. Discuss the spatial pattern of density of population in India.
Answer: The density of population in India (2011) is 382 persons per sq km, up from 117 persons per sq km in 1951, an increase of more than 200 persons per sq km over fifty years. This average, however, hides very wide spatial variation: density ranges from as low as 17 persons per sq km in Arunachal Pradesh to as high as 11,297 persons per sq km in the National Capital Territory of Delhi. Among the northern states, Bihar (1,102), West Bengal (1,029) and Uttar Pradesh (828) have higher densities, while among the peninsular states Kerala (859) and Tamil Nadu (555) are also comparatively dense. States such as Assam, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Jharkhand and Odisha have moderate densities. The hill states of the Himalayan region and the north-eastern states (other than Assam) have relatively low densities, while the Union Territories, except the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, have very high densities. Because simple density is only a crude measure of the man-land relationship, the physiological density (total population ÷ net cultivated area) and the agricultural density (total agricultural population ÷ net cultivable area) are used to get a more meaningful picture of the pressure of population on cultivated land, which matters greatly for a country like India with such a large agricultural population.
Q. Give an account of the occupational structure of India’s population.
Answer: India’s population is divided, by economic status, into main workers, marginal workers and non-workers: a main worker works for at least 183 days (six months) a year, and a marginal worker for fewer days. In 2011, workers (both main and marginal) made up only 39.8 per cent of the population, leaving about 60 per cent as non-workers, pointing to a large dependent population and the likelihood of significant unemployment or under-employment. The work participation rate itself varies widely, from about 29.1 per cent in Lakshadweep to about 51.9 per cent in Himachal Pradesh, and tends to be higher where economic development is lower, since subsistence-level activities need more manual workers. The 2011 Census divides the working population into four occupational categories: cultivators, agricultural labourers, household industrial workers, and other workers. Of the total working population, 54.6 per cent are cultivators and agricultural labourers, only 3.8 per cent work in household industries, and 41.6 per cent are other workers; male workers outnumber female workers in all three sectors, though female participation is comparatively higher in the primary sector. Spatially, Himachal Pradesh and Nagaland have a large share of cultivators, states such as Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh have more agricultural labourers, and the highly urbanised areas of Delhi, Chandigarh and Puducherry have a large share of workers in other services, reflecting limited farmland alongside heavy urbanisation and industrialisation.
4 In-text questions and activities (asked within the chapter)
Q. Examine Fig. 1.1 and try to describe the patterns of spatial distribution of population shown on it.
Answer: India has a highly uneven pattern of population distribution. Large concentrations are found in the North Indian Plains, the deltas and the Coastal Plains, and in urban regions such as Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Pune, Ahmedabad, Chennai and Jaipur. Population is sparse in the Himalayas, some north-eastern and western states (such as western Rajasthan) and the interior districts of southern and central Indian states. Uttar Pradesh has the highest population, followed by Maharashtra, Bihar and West Bengal.
Q. Looking at the data in Appendix i, arrange the Indian States and Union Territories according to their sizes and population and find out: States/UTs of large size and large population; States/UTs of large size but small population; States/UTs of smaller size but larger population.
Answer: Large size and large population: Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Gujarat. Large size but small population: Jammu & Kashmir, Arunachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand (the chapter’s own examples, with only 1.04%, 0.11% and 0.84% of India’s population), and Himachal Pradesh. Smaller size but larger population: Bihar, West Bengal and Kerala, and the NCT of Delhi among the Union Territories.
Q. Take the population growth data of the districts/selected districts of your respective state for total male and female population and represent them with the help of Composite Bar Graph.
Answer: Draw one bar for each district, its full height showing the total population (or its growth). Divide each bar into two parts, one for males and one for females, shaded differently, with the male part at the base and the female part stacked on top. Mark the districts on the x-axis and the population (or growth in %) on the y-axis to a suitable scale, and add a key. The data come from the Census of India district tables for your own state, so each student’s graph will differ.
Q. Compare the data of Appendix (iii) and identify the states/UTs with very high and very low proportion of urban population.
Answer: Very high: the NCT of Delhi and Chandigarh (over 97 per cent urban), Lakshadweep, Daman and Diu, Puducherry, and among states Goa (about 62 per cent), followed by Mizoram, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra. Very low: Himachal Pradesh (about 10 per cent), Bihar (about 11 per cent), Assam and Odisha. (Census 2011.)
Q. See how many languages appear on a Rs 10 note.
Answer: 17 languages: Hindi and English on the front, and 15 more languages in the language panel on the back (Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu).
Q. Look at Table 1.2 and prepare a pie diagram of linguistic composition of India showing the sectoral shares of each linguistic group. Or prepare a qualitative symbol map of India showing the distribution of different linguistic groups in the country.
Answer: Angle of each sector = percentage share × 3.6. Indo-European (Aryan) 73% = 262.8°; Dravidian 20% = 72°; Austric 1.38% = about 5°; Sino-Tibetan 0.85% = about 3°; the remaining 4.77% (other/unclassified) = about 17°. Draw a circle, mark the sectors in descending order clockwise from the vertical radius, shade each differently and add a key. (For the symbol map, use a different symbol for each family in its speech areas as listed in Table 1.2.)
Q. What is work participation rate?
Answer: The work participation rate is the proportion (percentage) of workers, both main and marginal, in the total population. In India it is only 39.8 per cent (2011), ranging from about 29.1 per cent in Lakshadweep to about 51.9 per cent in Himachal Pradesh.
Q. Prepare composite bar graphs, one for India and the other for your respective states showing the proportion of male and female workers in agriculture, household industries and other sectors, and compare.
Answer: For India, use Table 1.4 (2011): primary sector 26.30 crore workers (16.54 crore male, 9.76 crore female); secondary (household industries) 1.83 crore (0.98 crore male, 0.86 crore female); tertiary (other workers) 20.04 crore (15.66 crore male, 4.37 crore female). Draw one bar per sector with the male part at the base and the female part stacked on top, then do the same for your state from its Census data. The comparison will show that male workers outnumber female workers in all three sectors; female workers are most numerous in the primary sector (9.76 crore), while their proportion is highest in household industries (0.86 of 1.83 crore, nearly half).