Structure of Indian Society

About this unit

This unit introduces the basic building blocks of Indian society. It looks at the population of India in sociological terms (its size, growth, age composition, sex ratio and literacy) and at the way village and town are connected. Demography is not just numbers: the size and make-up of a population shape families, labour markets, schooling and public policy. Rural and urban life, similarly, are not sealed-off worlds but are tied together by migration, markets and administration.

Key ideas

• Demography: the systematic study of population, formal (counting) and social (explaining)
• Birth rate, death rate, natural growth rate and the demographic transition
• Age structure, dependency ratio and the demographic dividend
• Sex ratio and child sex ratio as indicators of gender bias
• Literacy as both a cause and an outcome of social change
• Rural-urban linkages: migration, remittances, markets and the spread of urban ways of life

How to prepare

Learn the definitions and how each ratio is calculated, because short numerical or interpretation questions are common. Be able to explain the stages of the demographic transition and the Malthusian argument with its criticisms. For rural-urban linkages, prepare examples of how villages and towns depend on each other.