Countdown to a north-south issue

Aastha Arora, India’s one-billionth baby, turned 24 on May 11. The world's eight-billionth babies will turn three on November 15. There were two claimants—one born in the Philippines, the other in the Dominican Republic.

- R. PRASANNAN

All these are guess work. We have no real count of the people breathing at this moment on the Indian earth. A guesstimate is, there are close to 1.5 billion.

That’s the statisticians’ nightmare. It took several millennia for us to number one billion. Now in a quarter century we have added half a billion. We will be two billion in still shorter time.

Our last headcount was in 2011, and the next due in 2021 when Covid came in the way. Covid has since gone; we celebrated three more Diwalis, Eids, Guru Purnimas, Christmases and a G-20 summit, held a general election and several assembly rounds but are yet to hold the headcount. Now the home office tells us— stand up, and be counted next year.