Lesson 2: Are we too many?

The next day when the teacher came to the class and was about to start the lesson,
Shanti Barua stood up and said, “Teacher, can I ask you a question, please?”
“Go ahead, Shanti,” said the teacher.

“In our last class, we heard Jamil’s story of how too many people made the ferry boat
sink. I have also seen crowds of people at the bus stand, railway station, launch and
steamer ghats. It is not uncommon to see people travelling on top of a bus or train
and meeting with tragic accidents. My question is: Are we really too many people in
the country?”
“Thank you, Shanti. Please sit down.”
The teacher then looked round the class and asked, “How many of you have the same
question in mind?”
Almost all the hands went up.
“Okay,” the teacher continued. “Finding the right answer to this question is very
important for us - for our national development. So we will look at this issue with
some facts so that we can find out if we are really too many or not.”
Project work: Discuss in groups and carry out a survey on this topic:
Where do we usually see big crowds? What are their natures and how do they affect
our life? You can do the following things:
Select only one small area such as your village or locality in the town /
city where you live.
Find out its area. (You can do it by walking around it. At normal speed
you can cover about one kilometre in ten minutes. )
Find out the number of people living in it.
Find out about the people’s occupations, unemployment and poverty.