Latest Census data shows youth surge: Nearly 41% of India's population is below the age of 20

The latest census 2011 data released on Tuesday shows that around 41 percent of India’s is below the age of 20 years. According to The Times of India, half the population is in the 20-59 age group while 9 percent is above the age of 60. According to the data, Muslims in the country have the highest proportion of children and teenagers among all religions. While 47 percent of the children and teenagers are Muslims, 40 percent are Hindus and 29 percent are Jains, the report said. The report also said that there are trends of declining proportion of children and increasing share of elderly across all religious communities. In August last year, the census data on religion had shown that the Muslim community had registered a moderate 0.8 percent growth to touch 17.22 crore in the 10-year period between 2001 and 2011, up from 13.8 crore, while Hindu population had shown a decline by 0.7 percent at 96.63 crore during the period. [caption id=“attachment_2581840” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. AFP[/caption] The data had also said that the Christian population is 2.78 crore (2.3 percent), Sikh 2.08 crore (1.7 percent), Buddhist 0.84 crore (0.7 percent), Jain 0.45 crore (0.4 percent), Other religions and persuasions (ORP) 0.79 crore (0.7 percent) and religion not stated 0.29 crore (0.2 percent). As per 2001 census, India’s total population was 102 crore, of which Hindu population comprised of 82.75 crore (80.45 percent) and Muslims were 13.8 crore (13.4 percent). The growth rate of population in the decade 2001-2011 was 17.7 percent. More alarming than the data on religious communities, however, was data on education. Census data released in November had revealed that only 4.5 percent of the population in the country is educated upto the level of graduate or above while a majority of 32.6 percent population is not even educated upto the primary school level. During the decade 2001-11, improvement was observed at middle and above educational levels and decline in percentage share at lower levels (below-primary and primary). The improvements at higher educational levels are indication of educational advancement in the country during the decade 2001-11. With inputs from PTI