ISLAMABAD: The population of disabled persons across the country has been registered less than 0.48 percent of the total population as per the recently concluded 6th Population and Housing Census 2017.
The population of disabled as per the 5th Population and Housing Census conducted in 1998 was recorded at 2.38 percent of the total population, indicating that there has been decline of 80% in the population of disabled persons.
“There are less than a million disabled persons living in the country as per the census data,” a top official of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) said, indicating that the decision to separately count the disabled was taken very late that could have affected headcount of disabled. The measure to separately count of disabled was taken after the Supreme Court of Pakistan’s decision to this effect.
The PBS officials said that questions were also being raised about the population of transgender people. “Their population is considered to be higher than the population registered in the recent population census,” he said. “We registered a person as transgender when he/she declares before the census staff to be registered in this particular category. If a transgender does not say to be transgender and wants to be registered in male or female category, the census staff will do accordingly,” the official said.
It is pertinent to mention here that the country’s current total population has been recorded at 207.7 million according to provisional figures of recently concluded 6th Population and Housing Census, showing an average annual growth rate of 2.4 percent from calendar year 1998, when the last population census was conducted.
According to provisional summary results of the census, which were presented in the Council of Common Interests, this includes 132,189,531 rural and 75,584,989 as urban population, which showed 2.23 percent and 2.7 percent growth rate over a period of 1998-2017.
The male population of the country stands at 106,449,322 whereas the female portion of population stands at 101,314,780, while the population of transgender has been recorded at 10,418. The provisional summary results show an overall increase in population by 57% over the year 1998, while the population increased by 146.6 % since Census-1981.
Published in Daily Times, September 13th 2017.