The shelf · India
Does Single by Choice hold up?
Single by Choice: Happily Unmarried Women!, by Kalpana Sharma (editor) (2019)
Essays by Indian women who chose not to marry.
The short answer
Its big figure holds for the 2011 census, though the data are now old. One essay's sum is wrong.
The claims, checked
India had 71 million single women in the 2011 census, up 39% on 2001.
Holds with conditions Matches IndiaSpend's analysis of the census (71.4 million women over 20, including widows). The data are 15 years old; the next census is in 2027.
Evidence: IndiaSpend analysis of Census 2011
Never-married women numbered 13.2 million rural plus 12.3 million urban, totalling 25.2 million.
Does not hold The two figures add up to 25.5 million, not 25.2 million.
Evidence: IndiaSpend analysis of Census 2011