He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestors, and proposed the

scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he [2] called natural selection.

[1]

Individuals less suited to the environment are less likely to survive and less likely to reproduce; individuals more suited to the environment are more likely to survive and more likely to reproduce and leave their inheritable traits to future generations, which produces the process ofnatural selection (inference).

Laureates
Year Laureates Subject Origin

1902

Ronald Ross

Medicine

Foreign citizens born in India

1907

Rudyard Kipling

Literature

Foreign citizens born in India

1913

Rabindranath Tagore

Literature

Citizen of British India

1930

C.V. Raman

Physics

Citizen of British India

1968

Har Gobind Khorana

Medicine

Foreign citizens of Indian origin

1979

Mother Teresa

Peace

Citizen of India

1983

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar Physics

Foreign citizens of Indian origin

1998

Amartya Sen

Economic Sciences Citizen of India

2009

Venkatraman Ramakrishnan

Chemistry

Foreign citizens of Indian origin

The demographics of India (7th largest country in the world) are inclusive of the second most populous country in the world, with over 1.21 billion people (2011 census), more than a sixth of the world's population. Already containing 17.5% of the world's population, India is projected to be the world's most populous country by 2025, surpassing China, its population reaching 1.6 billion by 2050.[4][5] Its population growth rate is 1.41%, ranking 102nd in the world in 2010.[6] India has more than 50% of its population below the age of 25 and more than 65% hovers below the age of 35. It is expected that, in 2020, the average age of an Indian will be 29 years, compared to 37 for China and 48 for Japan; and, by 2030, India's dependency ratio should be just over 0.4.[7]

Literacy in India is key for socio-economic progress,[1] and the Indian literacy rate grew to 75.06% in 2011 from 12% at the end of British rule in 1947.[2][3] Although this was a greater than sixfold improvement, the level is well below the world average literacy rate of 84%,[4] and India currently has the largest illiterate population of any nation on earth.

Poverty is widespread in India, with the nation estimated to have a third of the world's poor. According to a 2005 World Bank estimate, 41.6% of the total Indian population falls below the international poverty line of US$ 1.25 a day (PPP, in nominal terms 21.6 a day in urban areas and 14.3 in rural areas).[1]

36% of scientists at NASA are Indians