 India becomes most populous country in the world. According to the United Nations data, India has surpassed China to become world's most populous nation with 142.86 crore people. According to the UN World Population Touchboard, China has a population of 142.57 crore. India's population has grown by more than 1 billion people since 1950, the year the UN began gathering population data. Last year, the number of people in China shrank for the first time since 1960. Beijing ended its strict one-child policy imposed in the 1980s amid overpopulation fears in 2016 and started letting couples have three children in 2021.