TALKING SHOP: Deleterious and deadly

"Democracy, human dignity

and decency cannot survive

overpopulation. As we put

more people into the world,

the value of life declines. It does

not matter if someone dies..."

― Isaac Asimov

I don't like to spread bad news, but things are already quite smelly in the New Year that's just been rung in. Look at the quote above by Asimov, which underscores a very telling point, that massive numbers are not just deleterious; they are deadly and unsustainable. Nonetheless, India continues to ferociously procreate and multiply and is headed fast and straight to embrace the dubious distinction of being the most populous nation in the world. Very soon, we will overtake China as the nation with the most number of people on our soil, with a human head-count of nearly 145 crore. And come Year 2030, we would have crossed the 150-crore mark.

Around the world, there are growing concerns about the decline of democracy at all levels of various governments; and there are many research papers that suggest that overpopulation and technology are the major causes of this decline. Clearly, it is not possible (or wise, for that matter) to try to stop the development of technology, and thus, it is of utmost importance that countries, including India, move fast to address overpopulation.

Crunch these statistics—the United States is three times the size of India in land mass but has one-fifth of India's man-count numbers. Russia is five times the size of India but has a population of around 15 crore, one-tenth of that in our country. And China, which we are about to overtake in population figures, is also around three times India's size by land mass. Do note that I am not including Tibet in this, or Hong Kong, or the parts of Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh that China now occupies.

Tangential problems

This explosion in numbers will only exacerbate already existing problems plaguing the country—like rising unemployment, economic slowdown and shrinkage, availability of food and other natural resources, area of land per person, per capita income, lack of housing and schools, lack of infrastructure leading to poor living, increase in wastes and pollution, and much more. As it is, we are already among the most unemployed nation in the world, by the percentage of people who are now jobless and our economy, which was anyway in a mess, has been delivered a bludgeoning blow by the COVID-19 pandemic.

On 15 November 2022, the world crossed the redoubtable population figure of 8 billion people and none less than the United Nations declared that day as the 'Day of Eight Billion'. On that same day, the UN also declared that India would surpass China as the world's most populous country. Further, India was the largest contributor to the 8-billion-milestone, while China's contribution to the global population growth was said to be in the negative. Finally, India is projected to have a population of 166.8 crore in 2050, ahead of China's 131.7 crore.

Back to our problems; Indians as a people are already en route to becoming amongst the most intolerant and, in instances, communal. India has developed several fractures over the decades on the issue of population control. Communal clashes, intolerance over developmental questions such as Uniform Civil Code tend to deter any progress that the authorities attempt to make on the path to population control. All said and done, a number of disasters are lurking in the wings.

Not just an 'India' issue

The issue of overpopulation is not limited to India, obviously. Much of the rest of the world is grappling with this menace. For instance, in the United States, the people head-count in most smaller towns has jumped by five to seven times, leading to problems aplenty—feeding the people, over-exploitation and depletion of natural resources, law and order headaches, widening religious and ethnic divides, increased pressure on state-run facilities such as schools, hospitals and transport infrastructure, and much more.

Quite similar to what happened in the US around the Year 2000, India too has been facing the peculiar problem of runaway growth in amenities and over-development, directly as a result of population growth. Powerful forces in the private sector use population growth as an excuse to find more effective ways to grow their businesses fast. For instance, real estate developers are battling community groups which are concerned about preserving the sanctity of their natural environment and surroundings. Wealthy and influential business-persons are getting quite good at getting pretty much what they want from public officials, and it is the average citizen who is suffering.

Noted British broadcaster and natural historian Sir David Attenborough once labelled the world's swarming masses a "plague on the Earth". In his view, nearly every environmental problem the world is facing—from climate change to biodiversity loss, water stresses and conflicts over land—can be traced back to mankind's rampant reproduction over the last few centuries. In 1994, the global population was 5.5 billion people; we have just crossed 8 billion. And get a load of this, researchers from Stanford University calculated that the ideal size of our species would be between 1.5 and 2 billion people. Whew.

What can be done?

Well, you know the answer as well as I do and, thus, I shall not go into graphic details. What I will share is what the authorities worldwide are doing since April 2019, when the Commission on Population and Development met in New York to analyze how the Program of Action agreed upon in 1994 had been applied over the last 25 years. According to the commission, population growth could still be controlled and the situation could be reversed, achieving a balance between population and available resources.

To do so, Member States need to be involved in Sustainable Development Goals and the development of specific actions. Bluntly put, what is needed are good sex education programs and the effective implementation of family planning programs that enable access to contraception, reduce the number of unwanted children and, therefore, improve lives, allowing mankind to optimize resources and avoid situations of poverty, hunger or disease. On the human level, we all need to do our bit too (or maybe, not do it!).

Let me end the column and ring in the New Year 2023 with two telling quotes, with Prince Philip once notoriously saying: "Cannibalism is a radical but realistic solution to the problem of overpopulation." Well, that would be going a bit too far and macabre, so let's move on to Morris Strong, who recently said: "Either we reduce the world's population voluntarily, or nature will do it for us, but brutally." Those are words to chew on and ponder. Anyhow, Happy New Year.

The writer is a veteran journalist and communications specialist.
He can be reached on [email protected]. Views expressed are personal