India has a very large population. India is the world’s largest second country. They have about 1,027,015,147 persons. India has 531,277,078 males and 495,738,169 females. India only occupies 2.4% of the world's land area, but it supports over 15% of the world's population. India is a very crowded place. India's population rose by 21.34 % between 1991 - 2001. India has more people than all of Africa and also more than South America and North America together. That is a crazy amount of people living in such a small area. India’s population has tripled since 1947. One of India’s goals was to reduce the total fertility rate to 2.1 by 2010. India’s total fertility rate remains at the high number of 2.8. They did not achieve the goal of being at a 2.1 in total fertility rate. Although, the U.S. Census Bureau does predict a near-replacement total fertility rate of 2.2 to be achieved in India in the year 2050. India is expected to become the first and only county on the planet that will ever reach a population of more than 2 billion! Although, India has created several impressive goals to reduce its population growth rates, it and the rest of the world have a long way to go to achieve meaningful population control. http://geography.about.com/od/obtainpopulationdata/a/indiapopulation.htm
India has a very large amount of people living in one country, but India also has a very large amount of people in poverty. As of 2010, more than 37% of India’s population still lives below the poverty line. Since India has a phenomenal increase in population it causes a lot of poverty. A lot of this additional population is due to the large scale migration of rural families from villages to cities. A lot of Indian families migrate because of the poor employment opportunities in villages. Since 1970 the Indian government has had a number of programs designed to help decrease poverty, and it has been somewhat successful. http://www.economywatch.com/indianeconomy/poverty-in-india.html
In India there is a place called Mumbai. Mumbai is called the slums because it’s mostly people in poverty living there. The slums started to rise in the year 1950. There is trash everywhere, it is not a healthy environment to live in. The slum areas of Mumbai have never undergone in the proper planning and facilities such as the water, sewage, construction and drainage system. 60% of the population of Mumbai is living in the slums. People that visit India go to the slums to see all about it, it is called Slum Tourism. In 1985 the government has tried to help the problem and to work on the Slum Up gradation Project. The project only targeted the 10-12% of the slum population. The slum growth rate is a lot more than the growth of the general growth of the urban areas in Mumbai. The city is getting the name of 'Slumbay'.
In Human Geography class we are watching “Slum Dog Millionaire.” It is about the life of a boy who lives in the slums of Mumbai and goes on the Indian version of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.” I think the movie does portray a good look on what India’s poverty is like. The movie is filmed right in the slums of Mumbai. When we watch the movie we can really see what it is like. In the movie they have children begging for money and that really happens in the slums. Children work for gangsters and they have to beg on the streets for money and then give them to the people in charge. Some children even get their eyes burnt or physically harmed so people will feel bad and give them more money. The slums of Mumbai is a very hard place to live and I think this movie does show just exactly how hard it is to live there.
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