India has surpassed China as the world’s most populous country, according to new UN data, marking a historic crossover moment for the two Asian rivals that are set to shape business and world affairs in years to come.

According to the UN Population Fund’s World Population Dashboard, released on Wednesday, India’s population has surpassed 1.428bn, just overtaking China’s more than 1.425bn people.

The update in population estimates came as the world body’s main agency that tracks demographic trends, the UNFPA, released its annual State of World Population Report, which warned of growing “population anxieties” as the world’s total number of inhabitants surpassed 8bn.

The UN had already indicated that India’s population was on track to overtake China’s, a function of both falling Chinese fertility rates and continuing population growth in India.

Population growth is a politically sensitive topic in China and India, and both their governments were subdued in their responses to the demographic milestone.

“I want to tell you that population dividends don’t only depend on quantity but also on quality,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said in Beijing on Wednesday in remarks quoted by news agencies.

“Our population dividend has not disappeared, our dividend is forming, and the impetus for development is strong.”

India’s external affairs ministry spokesperson had no immediate comment.

China’s population fell in 2022 for the first time in 60 years, as deaths outstripped births and left the overall headcount at 1.41bn, according to Beijing’s calculations.

China’s birth rate has been in long-term decline in part due to the successful implementation of the One-Child Policy in 1980, which limited the number of children a couple could have to below the average of 2.1 needed for a country’s population to remain stable, or “replacement rate”. The authorities has eased this policy but the number of births in China has continued to fall.

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