Pakistan's population has ballooned to 207.68mn, shows census 2017 report

ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's population has surged to 207.68 million while population growth has recorded at 2.40 percent from 1998 to 2017, report of sixth Population and Housing Census-2017 revealed Tuesday.

The Council of Common Interests (CCI) in its meeting held on April 12, 2021, approved the final results of the 2017 census.

According to the latest statistics from the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, the country’s total population stands at 207.68 million which includes 106.018m males, 101.344m females, and 321,744 transgender persons.

According to the latest results of the fifth most populous country in the world, the predominant majority 132.013 million lives in rural areas while the urban population stands at 75.67 million- that makes it around 36.44 percent of the total population.

The southeastern province of Sindh is marked as the most urbanized province having a 51.88 percent population in urban areas, whereas, 48.12 percent rural population. The total population of the province is said to be around 47.85 million.

Meanwhile, the country’s financial hub Karachi remained the most populated city of Pakistan. At least 10,624,894 people lived in the provincial capital, revealed the Census-2017 report.

Punjab, being the largest province in terms of population, stood at 109.99 million people that earlier recorded 47.29 mn and 73.62mn people in the 1981 and 1998 exercises. The total population of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa stands at 30.51 million, Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) 4.99 million, Punjab 109.99 million, Sindh 47.85 million, Balochistan 12.34 million, and Islamabad 2 million.

The report suggests that 55.98 percent of the total population is between 15-64 years of age, while the youth 15-24 years of age constitute 19.19 percent of the total residents.

The literacy rate in the south Asian country has reached 58 percent which was earlier recorded at 43.92 percent in 1998.

The total population count includes 96.47 percent Muslims, followed by 1.27 percent Christians, 1.73% Hindus, 0.09pc Ahmadis. The report further revealed that at least 7.08% of the people mentioned Urdu as their mother language, 38.78 pc Punjabi, 14.57pc Sindhi, 18.24pc Pashto, 3.02pc Balochi, 0.17pc Kashmiri, 12.19pc Seraiki, 2.44pc Hindko, 1.24pc Brahvi, and 2.26pc others.

Let it be known that the Census-2017 was conducted in two phases, each phase comprised of 30 days. It started on March 15 and ended on May 24, 2017.

Earlier in April 2020, the central government had approved the official release of the Census-2017 results which had been withheld for the last couple of years due to a number of controversies.