Christophe Z. Guilmoto p 2 ? C& g Dakar Studies on Indian demography have now shifted their emphasis away from a general discussion concerning the whole subcontinent towards a more comprehensive approach centred on regional contexts. It is becoming obvious that in spite of its political unity, India presents a far too complex situation to be subjected to global analyses that tends to project a unified picture of highly diverse demographic regimes. True, as their history and sogal structure suggest, Indian populations do possess a lot in common and the similar evolution of demographic indicators in various regions bears witness of this homogeneity. Yet, some of the most interesting trends noticed in this country have to be related to their appearance in their regional context; fertiiity decline in Kerala and Punjab, urbanisation in industrial states, sex-differentials in mortality in north-western India. This call for ‘deconstructing’ Indian demography into its regional frontiers has already been heard by the historians and the demographers who have attempted to examine population dynamics in a longer perspective.‘ The massive quantity of information and data which the British started’ to gather during the nineteenth century includes demographic data which are attracting more and more attention; the interest of historians has slowly moved away from colonial India’s political eventsand structures towards a r better understanding of its social history. Demographic phenomena and their constant interaction with the fabric of the society were no doubt eminently local phenomena before a more recent period during which various communication networks (transportation, politics) have come to develop and make internal distances (a little) shorter. The present work aims precisely at describing the demographic trans- formations which took place in a geographical enclave, from the last I For various regional studies. see the pioneer work on Indian historical demography. Tim Dyson. ed. India’a’s Historical Demography: Siudies in Famine, Disease and Socier). London. 19x9. The Indian Economic and Social History Review, 29, 3 (1992) SAGE New DelhVNewbury ParWLondon The incepîioli of demographic transifion in south India I 249 248 t CHRISTOPHEZ.' GUILMOTO distributed in the region there was hardly any empty tract at this time. The century tili the eve of tlie large-scale family planning campaign in the troubled period of the late eighteenth century which preceded the comple- 1960s. The period under review (ca.1870-ca. 1960) encapsulates the tion of colonial control over south India had left Tamil Nadu in a state of turning point of Tamil Nadu's demographic history (the inter-war period) desolation, especially where Maratha armies and Anglo-Mysorean wars and it is not a coincidence that it should correspond with a longer period had heavily disturbed rural society and forced numerous peasant com- during which the Tamil country experienced a real opening-up: people, goods and viruses came to be more easily exchanged with the rest of India munities to flee. Against this background, the first part of the last century was a period of demographic redistribution and consolidation in Tamil and the outer world, and the region's relative demographic and economic Nadu. isolation started to dissipate. The region examined here became an administrative unit only during the Population dynamics dating from this period are however insufficiently 1950s when all the Tamil-speaking areas in south India were clubbed documented. The first population counts attempted by the British yield togcther to form the state OP Tard Nadu (previously Madras state). Most dubious figures which are extremely difficilit to jr~terpret.~The demo- graphic data which are available come from estimates established indirectly of Tamil Nadu was previously part of a much larger, multilingual Madras Presidency which extended westwards to the Arabian Sea (Malabar) and (from village heads for rural areas) and present a large variety of deficiencies northwards along coastal Andhra. Whereas most historical studies have (including overestimates). Even in the districts which were the first to fall under British control the results of the pre-1871 population censuses do not followed the administrative boundaries as they had been defined by the appear to have been much more accurate than in the rest of the Madras colonial authorities we prefer to use as much as possible present-day boundaries which we believe are more representative of the socio-historical Pre~idency.~ patterning of south India. Therefore the data examined here pertain solely For all their flaws these figures are the only ones from where to start our análysis and the picture of the region they tend to project is rather that of a to the Tamil part of the Madras Presidency and are based on a statistical global, sustained population growth after the first third of the nineteenth reconstruction that starts from the current administrative division of the century. Estimates arrived at by Bhattacharya place the growth for the states.' whole of the Madras Presidency at a level of 4.6 per lo00 during 1801-71 Crises and instability: The old régime and of 11.4 per 1000 during 1841-71.s Demographic increase of the Presi- dency during the later 1871-1921 was of same order (6.1 per 1OOO) and only marginally higher for Tamil Nadu (6.3 per 1OOO). The figure for 1801-71 is No periodisation could be more arbitrary than that based on the availability at best a brief summary of seventy years a demographic Tegime char- of statistics. Unfortunately demographers can hardly avoid usiñg 1871 as a of acterised by a high level of instability. The first decades probably ex- baseline for a historical perspective on Indian demography because of the perienced a rather low level of natural increase, often totally offset by tremendous changes in sources brought about by the first 1871-72 census in mortality outbreaks. The 1841-71 period, with its buoyant annual growth several parts of the subcontinent. We will therefore devote a small, separate section of this paper to the pre-census period. Possible changes in the ' The 1871 census gives a summary description of the quinquennial census started 20 yean demographic growth during the nineteenth century such as the alleged earlier. See Census ofrhe Madras Presidency 1871. Vol. I-Report and Appendices, pp. 1-3. mortality increase at the turn of the century still lay hidden [email protected] Results of the first counts are presented (not without several discrepancies) in Dharma ~ -.* - --- . -ce'. reliable statistics dating back to the first population estimates gathered-by - Kumar. Land and Caste in South India: Agriculrural Lnbouf in the Madras Presidency during the British in south India. .,x the 19th Century, Cambridge, 1965, pp. 120-23, and Roland Lardinois. 'Deserted Villages - .and Depopulation in Rural Tamil Nadu c. 1780-c. 1830. in Dyson, India's Historical Demo- graphy. p. 31. The beginning of the colonial period ' Baker suggests that districts where the colonial administration was set up earlier display statistics of a better quality. But the irregular demographic evolution of an old British At the occasion of the first modern census of 1871 Tamil Nadu's population territory like Salem (with numerous peaks and troughs between 1800 and 1871) offers no amounted to more than 15 million inhabitants. The most populated district confirmation on this point. See CA. Baker. An lridrun Rural Economy 1880-1955: The Tamilnud Countryside. Delhi. 1YM. p. 83. of Thanjavur contained 1.85 million inhabitants as againsi only 100,OOO for ' Durgaprasad Bhattacharya. 'Historical Demography in India-Scope. Source and Mate- the small hilly district of the Nilgiris. Though population was not evenly rials and Some Crucial Problems in Outline'. communication presented in the Symposium on Historicul Demogruphy in India. Bangalore. 1985. One should keep in miqd that although Sec the appendix. This paper is based on parts of my doctoral dissertation: Christophe these tentative figurcs are far from being undisputable (see our estimation below). they offer Guilmoto, .sièrle de de"ogrup/lre lumoule: erwiimtion des sources et unuly5e de I'P~'o1111ion 2. Un more rciiahle estimates than the census data. de Irr popidution du Tumil Mudir de 1871 à 1981. Paris. lor!hcoming. The inception.of demographic transition in south 1ndia.l 251 - - . , :. ,-:::<:-- ~ _:_i -c. ' . above 10 per 1009, marked the end of a long period of stagnatioa6The first be identified with a stable female populationio with a life expectancy at reason behind this instability was of course the recurrence of subsistence : ' birth of 27.6 years. If .this model is .taken 'as representative of Tamil crises which usually followed climatic accidents. Whilst the worst famine to Nadu, birth and death rates would have been respectively of 49.1 per visit south India during this century (Guntur famine in 1833-34) spared 1000 and 37.7 per 1000 at the middle of the nineteenth century. A Tamil Nadu to a certain degree, the region nevertheless experienced similar estimation procedure based on the low 1801-71 growth rate several grave demographic crises, starting with a dearth in 1799. Five would lead to an unlikely life expectancy of 20 years and shows the years later, from the end of 1804 till the 1807 monsoon, the Coromandel fragility of our data base. Coast, usually favoured by more generous rainfalls endureci a long famine. Other estimates for India as a whole generally point to a much higher Again, in 1812-13, 1824, 1833, 1847 and 186566, several Tamil districts death rate than 37.7 per lo00 L. and P. Visariaset the death rate at about met with severe subsistence crises, localised dearths which degenerated 45 per lo00 between 1750 and 1850. They also mention the possibility of a into regional famines after successive monsoon failures.' Moreover, mortality reduction in Madras during the first half of the last century." ;": .