 Hello everyone, welcome to Chanakya IS Academy's current affairs. In this video, we will discuss about UNFPA report on Indian aging. Let's see why it is in the news. With the decadal growth rate of the elderly population of India estimated at 41% and its share of the total population projected to double to over 20% by 2050, the United Nations Population Fund India in its 2023 India Aging report has said that by 2046 it is likely that the elderly population will have surpassed the population of children aged up to 15 in the country. Now we will talk about the key findings of the report. Studies says challenges facing India's aging population are the feminization and ruralization of older population and policies must be framed accordingly. More than 40% of the elderly in India are in the poorest wealth quintile with about 18.7% of them living without an income, the report said adding that such levels of poverty may affect their quality of life and health care utilization. The report projected that the population of people aged 80 and above will grow at a rate of around 279% between 2022 and 2050 with a predominance of widowed and highly depended very old women, a finding in line with the pattern across several nations. The data showed that women on an average had a higher life expectancy as the age of 60 and 80 when compared with men with variations across the states and union territories. Further, the sex ratio number of females per thousand males. Among the elderly has been climbing steadily since 1991 while the ratio in the general population has been stagnating. Between 2011 and 2021, the ratio increased in India as a whole and across all regions barring the union territories and western India. In the northeast and the east, while the sex ratio of the elderly increased, it remained below thousand in both years indicating that men still outnumber women in these regions even at 60 plus years. Poverty is inherently gendered in old age when older women are more likely to be widowed living alone with no income and with fewer assets of their own and fully dependent on family force support. The report said pointing out that the major challenges facing India's aging population are the feminization and ruralization of this older population and that policies must be designed to suit their specific needs. Let's discuss variation in states. In Himachal Pradesh and Kerala, women at 60 have a life expectancy of 23 and 22 years respectively which is 4 year more than that of men at 60 in these states as compared with the national average differential of only a year and half. The report said, life expectancy of women at 60 is greater than 20 years in states such as Rajasthan, Haryana, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh and the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir raising concerns about their social and economic well-being. The report noted that there was a significant interstate variation in absolute levels and growth of the elderly population as well reflecting the different stages and pace of demographic transition across states. Most states in southern region and select northern states such as Himachal Pradesh and Punjab reported a higher share of the elderly population than the national average in 2021, a gap that is expected to widen by 2036, the report said. While the state reporting higher fertility rates and lagging in demographic transition including Bihar and Uttar Pradesh expect to see an increase in the share of the elderly population between 2021 and 2036. The level will remain lower than the Indian average, the report said. Compared with the southern and western India, central and north eastern regions have states with younger groups as indicated by the aging index. In the southern region, the old age dependency ratio was higher than the national average at about 20 as a true of western India at 17. Overall, union territories and the north eastern region reflected lower old age dependency ratios. We conclude today's topic here. Tomorrow we will meet with a new topic. Till then, please like, share and subscribe our channel. Thank you so much.