How many children are there in India?

                  India with 1.21 billion people constitutes as the second most populous country in the world, while children represents 39% of total population of the country. While an absolute increase of 181 million in the country’s population has been recorded during the decade 2001-2011, there was a reduction of 5.05 millions in the population of children aged 0-6 years during 2010-11. The decline in male children was 2.06 million and in female children is 2.99 millions. The share of Children (0-6 years) in the total population has showed a decline of 2.8 points in 2011, compared to Census 2001 and the decline was sharper for female children than male children in the age group ( 0-6 years).

                  Uttar Pradesh (19.27%) is the state with highest children’s population in the country followed by Bihar (10.55 %), Maharashtra (8.15 %), West Bengal (6.81 %) and Madhya Pradesh (6.46%) constitutes 52% of Children’s population in the country. The number of boys has dropped 2.42 per cent and that of girls 3.80 per cent. Population (0-6 years) 2001-2011 registered minus 3.08 percent growth with minus 2.42 for males and -3.80 for females. The proportion of Child Population in the age group of 0-6 years to total population is 13.1 percent while the in 2001 was 15.9 percent.

  The Indian Penal Code (IPC) 1860 finds that no child below the age of seven may be held criminally responsible for an action (Sec 82 IPC). In case of mental disability or inability to understand the consequences of one's actions the criminal responsibility age is raised to twelve years (Sec 83 IPC). A girl must be of at least sixteen years in order to give sexual consent, unless she is married, in which case the prescribed age is no less that fifteen. With regard to protection against kidnapping, abduction and related offenses the given age is sixteen for boys and eighteen for girls.

According to  the Indian Constitution all children between the ages of six to fourteen should be provided with free and compulsory education. . The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986 defines a child as a person who has not completed fourteen years of age. The Factories Act, 1948 and Plantation Labour Act 1951 states that a child is one that has not completed fifteen years of age and an adolescent is one who has completed fifteen years of age but has not completed eighteen years of age.                                                                                      

                                                                    Sipriya MACJ