Definition of "demand" []

• To ask for urgently or peremptorily: demand an investigation into the murder; demanding that he leave immediately; demanded to speak to the manager. (verb-transitive)
• To claim as just or due: demand repayment of a loan. (verb-transitive)
• To ask to be informed of: I demand a reason for this interruption. (verb-transitive)
• To require as useful, just, proper, or necessary; call for: a gem that demands a fine setting. (verb-transitive)
• Law To summon to court. (verb-transitive)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Notes payable _on demand_, or in which no time of payment is mentioned, are due immediately, and no demand of payment is necessary."
• "_that_, but you could not know the awful, the horrid threat he held out to me, if I did not comply with his demand -- ay, _demand_ for an immediate union?"
• "Over the next decade, China's annual grain demand is likely to reach 573 million tons, which is above its current production levels."