Demography Dictates

Demography is the study of human populations, including their size, growth, density, distribution and statistics regarding birth, marriage, disease and death. Demographic analysis also tries to understand the human composition of a specific geographical area in terms of education, nationality, religion, and ethnicity.

I would like to share an incident, which made me realise the impact of demographic composition.

I had the privilege of attending the graduation ceremony of my son, Sidhaarth who completed his medical studies at Davao Medical School, Philippines.

The Graduation Ceremony was well organised as per the protocols and it was interesting for me to observe the many rituals that happened in the ceremony. Like every other formal ceremony, this programme too had the Prayer Song and National Anthem.

As students from different countries study there, they sing/recite the prayer song of all religions and also the National Anthem of the different countries, so that the students belonging to different religions and nationality feel pleased and proud.

And here is where something surprising happened. The first National Anthem to be played was the Indian National Anthem, although, the ceremony was happening in Philippines. This was followed by the National Anthem of other country students and finally the Philippines National Anthem.

Similarly, the first prayer song that was sung was the Hindu prayer, although, Philippines is predominantly a Christian populated country. And again it was followed by Muslim Prayer and then the Christian prayer.

I was perplexed as to, why it is so? Why is it that in a foreign country, they are giving a higher priority to a minority nationality or religion? At first, I thought it was because it is a protocol or sort of a courtesy, to play the Prayer Song or National Anthem of the host country last, but later I realised that it was the demography of the college students, that was the determining criteria. So, although the college is in Philippines, it is the demographic composition of the college students that decides the protocol.

If we look at the human evolution too or the way humans have migrated and occupied the land mass in this world, we can see that the dominant ethnic population, has an upper hand over the others. That is why; we can find the Chinese and Indians, in almost any part of the world. When opportunities become curtailed in a country due to excess population, it is natural for people to go out in search of a land that offers a better future.

Like the ancient Tamil scripture, Purananooru which says, “திரைகடல் ஓடியும் திரவியம் தேடு” which means “travel across the seas in search of wealth”. This is what every King or Ruler did too, from the past at the macro level.  It was either in search of Gold, Precious Stones, Mines or Oil. But in the micro level, people travel abroad in search of jobs, business opportunities, learning etc.

No wonder so many Indians have migrated to US, Europe and many other countries. We proclaim proudly that some of the best brains in the world are Indians. We have a proud list that includes Kalpana Chawla, Satya Nadella, Sundar Pichai and Indra Nooyi to name just a few.  The Indian Diasora spread across the world has helped Indians find a much larger global presence.

While this has been a positive thing for a few ethnicities, it has been a threat to many natives too. There are many countries where the natives have lost their voice, because of the excessive inflow of migrants. Later, this becomes a cause of hue and cry, which leads to conflicts at the social and political level too. This leads to stringent laws against immigrants and it is a worthy concern of any country, as the native population are deprived of their jobs and opportunities. It is undoubtedly a proactive measure of any country, because it is inevitable that the demographic composition will have a big influence on the laws of the land.

 

 D. Senthil Kannan,

  Managing Trustee, PALMS, Tuticorin.

  Author of "Transformational Thoughts" - A Journey of learning 

  Email: senthilkannand@gmail.com