New Delhi, July 10 -- For decades, India's demographic debate revolved around one question: how fast the population was growing. Public policy concentrated on fertility rates and family planning. However, the sixth National Family Health Survey (NFHS-6, 2023-24) marks a decisive transition. India has entered a new demographic era where the central challenge is no longer population size but population quality-how well people are educated, healthy, economically secure, and able to exercise agency.
As Amartya Sen's capability approach argues, economic growth and demographic advantage are meaningful only when they enhance human capabilities. In this lens, NFHS-6 is an audit of India's human capital, because its human capital drives long-term economic competitiveness.
The survey records significant progress: spousal physical or sexual violence has fallen from 29.2% to 22.3%, child marriage among women aged 20-24 declined to 20.1%, and reported sexual violence before age 18 dropped from 1.2% to 0.7%. Fertility remains below replacement level nationally, confirming the demographic transition is largely complete. Yet, these national gains mask regional disparities, as India has several vastly different social realities where human capability increasingly depends on where one is born.
No state illustrates this better than Bihar. Female secondary schooling is just 33.1%, child marriage stands at 34.6%, and spousal violence reaches 36.1%. This intergenerational cycle of educational deprivation, economic vulnerability, and gender violence cannot be broken by criminal statutes alone.
At the other end lies Kerala, which complicates conventional development assumptions. It boasts India's highest female schooling rate (86.6%) and lowest child-marriage rates (2.9%), yet reported spousal violence has sharply risen from 9.8% to 17.7%.
Similarly, in Andhra Pradesh, urban women report higher spousal violence than rural women despite greater workforce participation. These anomalies demonstrate that while indispensable, education and employment do not guarantee safety or autonomy. Population quality requires the capability to exercise meaningful choices.
Capability is also shaped by health and nutrition. While NFHS-6 shows continued maternal and child health improvements, persistent malnutrition and anaemia undermine cognitive development, education, and future productivity. Investing in nutrition, preventive healthcare, and early childhood development must become as central to demographic policy as expanding education.
The next phase of India's demographic policy should rest on five structural pillars:
First, secondary education must be the foremost demographic investment. NFHS-6 shows girls who stay in school are far less likely to marry early or experience adolescent pregnancy. Yet, only 46.4% of women complete ten years of schooling (compared with 54.6% of men), with rural female completion below 40%. Programmes like Beti Bachao Beti Padhao must evolve into incentives for secondary school completion.
Second, policy must move beyond financial inclusion to asset ownership, which provides real bargaining power. Though nearly 89% of women have bank accounts, only 18.8% of households report women owning land or housing. We must incentivise joint or female ownership through lower stamp duties and preferential credit.
Third, digital inclusion is essential public infrastructure. With only 64.3% of women ever using the internet compared with 80.5% of men, Digital India should prioritise affordable smartphones, digital literacy, and rural connectivity.
Fourth, the unequal burden of reproductive responsibility must be addressed. Female sterilisation accounts for 36.5% of contraceptive use, while male sterilisation remains just 0.5%. With teenage pregnancy at 6.7%, family planning must promote male participation to support women's economic independence.
Finally, India must prepare for an ageing society. With rising life expectancy, the country faces growing demands for elderly healthcare, pensions, and age-friendly employment. Demographic success must be measured by how effectively India supports healthy, productive ageing.
As the demographic dividend narrows, investing in human capital is urgent. Future growth will depend on the productivity, health, and skills of the people India already has. The defining question is whether its people are equipped to innovate, sustain growth, and support an aging society through evidence-based, state-specific interventions.
India's rank of 131 out of 148 in the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report underscores that economic ambition cannot outpace social transformation. Equal access to education, productive assets, digital opportunities, and reproductive agency is as critical as legal reform.
India has spent decades counting its people; its next chapter must focus on investing in them. The demographic transition is complete, but the capability transition has just begun. India's future prosperity will ultimately depend on how many of its people are empowered to realise their full potential.
Views expressed are personal.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.