India is a country in
South Asia
South Asia is the southern subregion of Asia, which is defined in both geographical
Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth descr ...
. It is the
seventh-largest country by geographical area, the
second-most populous country with
over 1.2 billion people. India consists of twenty-eight
state
State may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State
* ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States
* ''Our S ...
s and eight
union territories.
It is a home to 17.5 percent of the
world's population.
The first population
census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses in ...
in
British India
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...
was conducted in 1872. Since 1951, a census has been carried out every 10 years.
The census in India is carried out by the Office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner under the
Ministry of Home Affairs
An interior ministry (sometimes called a ministry of internal affairs or ministry of home affairs) is a government department that is responsible for internal affairs.
Lists of current ministries of internal affairs
Named "ministry"
* Ministry ...
, and is one of the largest administrative tasks conducted by a federal government.
The latest population figures are based on data from the
2011 census of India
The 2011 Census of India or the 15th Indian Census was conducted in two phases, house listing and population enumeration. The House listing phase began on 1 April 2010 and involved the collection of information about all buildings. Information ...
.
India has 641,000 inhabited villages and 72.2 percent of the total population reside in these rural areas.
Of them 145,000 villages have population size of 500–999 persons; 130,000 villages have population size of 1000–1999 and 128,000 villages have population size of 200–499. There are 3,961 villages that have a population of 10,000 persons or more.
India's 27.8 percent urban population lives in more than 5,100 towns and over 380 urban agglomerations.
In the decade of 1991–2001, migration to major cities caused rapid increase in urban population.
The number of Indians living in urban areas has grown by 31.2% between 1991 and 2001. Yet, in 2001, over 70% lived in rural areas. According to the 2011 census, there were 52
[A -4 TOWNS AND URBAN AGGLOMERATIONS CLASSIFIED BY POPULATION SIZE CLASS IN 2011 WITH VARIATION SINCE 1901 - Class I https://censusindia.gov.in/nada/index.php/catalog/42876] (don't be confused - as per provisional census 53)
million-plus cities in India (independent city is taken only if it is not a part of any urban agglomeration, otherwise urban agglomeration is taken), with
Mumbai
Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...
,
Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders ...
and
Kolkata
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...
having populations over 10 million.
There are 52
[A -4 TOWNS AND URBAN AGGLOMERATIONS CLASSIFIED BY POPULATION SIZE CLASS IN 2011 WITH VARIATION SINCE 1901 - Class I https://censusindia.gov.in/nada/index.php/catalog/42876] (don't be confused - as per provisional census 53) town/urban agglomerations (independent town is taken only if it is not a part of any urban agglomeration) in
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
with a population of 1 million or more as of 2011 against 35 in 2001 before revision of population of Towns/Urban Agglomerations in Kerala
[A -4 TOWNS AND URBAN AGGLOMERATIONS CLASSIFIED BY POPULATION SIZE CLASS IN 2011 WITH VARIATION SINCE 1901 - Class I https://censusindia.gov.in/nada/index.php/catalog/42876].
[ About 43 percent of the urban population of India lives in these cities.]
List
*''The cities/Urban Agglomerations (U.A.) which are listed in bold are either the capital of the respective state / union territory or the capital is part of the respective Town/U.A. - example Gandhinagar
Gandhinagar (, ) is the capital of the state of Gujarat in India. Gandhinagar is located approximately 23 km north of Ahmedabad, on the west central point of the Industrial corridor between Delhi, the political capital of India, and Mum ...
, a state capital is a part of the Ahmedadbad U.A.[A -4 TOWNS AND URBAN AGGLOMERATIONS CLASSIFIED BY POPULATION SIZE CLASS IN 2011 WITH VARIATION SINCE 1901 - Class I https://censusindia.gov.in/nada/index.php/catalog/42876] U.A. is added after the name of Urban Agglomeration (U.A.) but it is not added after the independent town which is not a part of any U.A.. The mentioned final figures are slightly different from provisional figures.''
Source: [A -4 TOWNS AND URBAN AGGLOMERATIONS CLASSIFIED BY POPULATION SIZE CLASS IN 2011 WITH VARIATION SINCE 1901 - Class I https://censusindia.gov.in/nada/index.php/catalog/42876]
Note: * Chandigarh U.A. was in the list of million plus populous Town/U.A. as per provisional census having 51st rank but finally, it was excluded from the list of million plus populous Town/U.A. with 55th rank after two less than million populous Town/U.A - Mysore U.A., Bareilly U.A. and as a result of it, number of million plus populous Town/U.A. is 52 though as per provisional census it was 53. As a result, the rank of Tiruchirappalli changed from 52 to 51 and that of Kota 53 to 52.
See also
* List of cities in India by population
The following tables are the list of cities in India by population. Often cities are bifurcated into multiple regions (municipalities) which results in creation of cities within cities which may figure in the list. The entire work of this article ...
* List of metropolitan areas in India
This is a list of metropolitan areas by population in India. The 74th Amendment to the Indian Constitution defines a metropolitan area as: An area having a population of 10 Lakh or 1 Million or more, comprised in one or more districts and con ...
* List of states and union territories of India by population
* Demographics of India
India is the second most populated country in the world with a sixth of the world's population. According to official estimates, India's population stood at 1.38 billion.
Between 1975 and 2010, the population doubled to 1.2 billio ...
Notes
References
Further reading
*
*
*
External links
Office of the Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India
{{Cities of India
Urban
Urban means "related to a city". In that sense, the term may refer to:
* Urban area, geographical area distinct from rural areas
* Urban culture, the culture of towns and cities
Urban may also refer to:
General
* Urban (name), a list of people ...
Urbanization in India