According to Adam Smith, the annual labour of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all necessaries and conveniences of life.
In fact, effort and ability of the people that determine the level of production and pace of growth. Therefore, size, helps to promote economic development of a country.
As regards the size of population, India comes next to China. It occupies 2.4 percent of world area and with 1.5% of world income, India is maintaining 15% of world’s population. It shows that there is excessive burden of population. In 1981, India’s population was 68 crore which in 1991 increased to 84.63 crore and further to 1027 crore in 2001. This indicates that growth rate of population in India is very high. In the words of Kingslay Davis, “India’s population up to 1911 remained constant at about 12 crores. The reason being that both birth and death rate were very high but were almost equal.
The present population of India is more than the total population of USA and Russia taken together whereas these two countries have 21 percent of the world area. Besides, 40 percent of the world income comes from these two countries. Population of India is more than the total population of all states of Africa and Latin America. It is evident that density of population in India is very high. Such a high density of population of a predominantly agricultural country is not desirable from the point of view of economic development.
In the matter of population and area, there is not of difference among 28 states and 7 territories of India. Among the states, UP has a population of 16.6 crore, Madhya Pradesh has a population of 6 crore. Population of Punjab is 2.24 crore. Haryana has a population of 2.1 crore. Himachal Pradesh has a population of 60.7 lakh. Among the states of India, Sikkim has the smallest population of 5.40 lakh.