The following is excerpted with permission from Rohit Saran’s book 100 Ways to See India: Stats, Stories, and Surprises, published by HarperCollins.Some of the most revealing stories about India today are hidden in plain sight – in government surveys, academic reports, private studies, and international databases being published every day. But being available isn’t the same as being accessible. Datasets are often so dry, dense, or fragmented that it takes the endurance of a camel and the patience of a saint to find the right data, clean it, visualise it, and build compelling stories around it.Never before have we had so much data – and such urgent need to make sense of it. We are flooded with numbers, but starved for insight.100 Ways to See India: Stats, Stories, and Surprises, Rohit Saran, HarperCollins, 2026.Data feels like the ultimate truth. But even the truest number can mislead. Take averages, for instance. In 2025, the average age of world leaders reached an all-time high. But look closely and the rise is driven by authoritarian regimes; in most democracies, leaders are actually younger today than in the 1970s.Or consider crime. Delhi and Kerala top India’s crime charts—until you realise they also record crimes better. Jharkhand, which ranks lowest in overall crime, has the highest murder rate. A data success can easily be dressed up as a crisis.The challenge is to bridge the gap between data’s potential and its pitfalls—to ensure that it serves as a tool for clarity, not confusion.Facts don’t take sides. But they can help you see all sides more clearly.India Abroad: The World’s Most Powerful Migrants‘India’s diaspora is bigger and more influential than any in history.’This is how The Economist headlined its 2023 feature on Indian migrants. As charts in this chapter show, India doesn’t just have the largest diaspora—it has several diasporas. Together they tell a story of migration, aspiration, and transformation that spans continents and centuries.As of January 2025, 3.4 crore people of Indian origin lived in 200+ countries—more than the population of Australia. They were split between non-resident Indians (NRIs) and persons of Indian origin (PIOs) quite widely across countries. While early migrations were linked to indentured labour and colonial ties, recent flows reflect a different force: the global hunger for skilled professionals. Indian-origin professionals now dominate tech, medicine, academia, and entrepreneurship across the West. There’s another Indian diaspora – bigger, poorer, and less visible. According to IIM-Ahmedabad’s Chinmay Tumbe, over 45 crore Indians live outside their home districts. That’s one in three Indians. A chunk of it resembles its global counterpart – educated, rich, and influential. But the majority move for survival – drought, discrimination, joblessness, or hopelessness. Many lack voter rights, access to welfare, and housing in their work cities. Their remittances, however, sustain entire villages, and their labour runs everything from construction to service to the delivery economy. Both groups share one thing: the belief that life can be better elsewhere. Why Nobody in India Is Jobless after 30No matter the gender or location (urban or rural), Indian youth face far higher unemployment than the national average – up to 4 times higher. Urban young women (age 15–29) are the worst off – over 20% can’t find jobs. Nearly 13% urban young men too are unemployed.But here’s the twist: once people cross age 29, unemployment starts vanishing. Why? Because they stop looking for jobs and become self-employed, which is counted as being in employment. Nearly 60% of employment in India is self-employment. Among women, it is 67%. And a third of these are unpaid helpers, often family members working for no wages. That’s where many youth unable to find jobs end up – technically employed, but often unpaid and invisible. The job most people aspire to – ‘regular salary’ – is held by just 22% of the employed. Some good news: the share of casual labour (the lowest paid category) has shrunk slightly in recent years, while salaried roles have grown. A welcome shift is more women entering the workforce. But that progress is blurred if large shares are unpaid helpers. It’s a form of disguised unemployment and under-employment – a key reason so many Indians with jobs need daily free food.Rohit Saran is the managing editor of The Times of India. He has served as executive editor of The Times of India, The Economic Times, and India Today, and was editor-in-chief of Business Today and Khaleej Times. Since the 1990s, he has practised data and visual journalism across leading newsrooms – blending numbers, visuals, and text to tell richer stories and to create enduring annual news products.