Have the final say on “population control”

On July 11, World Population Day, a Union minister tweeted alarm at what he called the “population explosion” in the country, wanting all political parties to adopt population control laws and revoking the right to vote of those with more than two children. Just a month earlier, a prominent businessman and yoga guru wanted the government to enact a law where “the third child should not be allowed to vote and enjoy government provided facilities”. This, he said, would ensure that people would not give birth to more children.

Both of these claims are capricious and represent distorted thinking that was fairly well refuted in the 2018-19 Economic Survey. The study notes that India is expected to experience a “sharp slowdown in population growth over the next two decades”. The fact is that by the 2030s, some states will begin the transition to an aging society as part of a well-studied process of “demographic transition” that sees nations slowly move towards a stable population as fertility rates decline with an improvement in the social and economic situation. indices of development over time.

Dangerous pictures

The demand for state controls on the number of children a couple can have is not new. It feeds on the perception that a large and growing population is the root of a nation’s problems while more and more people hunt fewer and fewer resources. This image is so ingrained in people’s minds that it does not take much to stir up public opinion which, in turn, can quickly escalate into deep class or religious conflict between the poor, the weak , the oppressed and minorities to the most privileged sectors. From this point to naming, targeting and attacking is a dangerous and short slide. The implications of such an approach are deep and wide but not easy to grasp because the argument is framed in sterile numbers and a rule that, it seems, applies to all sections equally. On the contrary, what is suggested is the ugliest form of discrimination, worse than physical aggression or social prejudice, because it breaks down the poor and the weak little by little, and in a very insidious way.

Policy of choice

The fig leaf of population control helps make the outrageous argument that a family will be virtually ostracized and a citizen will be denied their basic rights if they are born as their third child. This, of course, has never been public policy in India.

In fact, a far-sighted and forward-looking National Population Policy (NPP) was introduced in 2000 when Atal Bihari Vajpayee was Prime Minister. The essence of the policy was the government’s commitment to “voluntary and informed choice and consent of citizens while enjoying reproductive health care services” as well as a “target-free approach in administering family planning services.” “. This is a position reiterated by various governments, including the current government on the floor of both Houses of Parliament. For example, in March 2017, the then Minister of State (Health and Family Welfare), Anupriya Patel, in a written response to the Lok Sabha, noted that “the family planning program in India is inherently free and voluntary and it is the prerogative of clients to choose a method of family planning that best suits them in accordance with their reproductive rights”.

Then-Minister of Health JP Nadda said much the same thing. About a year ago, he articulated the “Life Cycle Framework” which looks at the health and nutrition needs of mothers and children not only during pregnancy and childbirth, but “from the moment of conception until the child grows up…to adolescence…and beyond”. This argument is not about denying services, but about providing choices and a range of services to mother and child, with the understanding that the demographic dividend cannot help sustain growth and create opportunities for people. ordinary than when the population is healthy.

Crucial Connections

Thus, the health of the family, the survival of the children and the number of children of a woman are closely linked to the levels of health and education of the parents, and in particular of the woman; thus, the poorer the couple, the more children they have. It is a relationship that has little to do with religion and everything to do with the opportunities, choices and services that are available to people. The poor tend to have more children because the child survival rate is low, son preference remains high, children contribute to the economic activity of poorer households and thus meet economic and emotional needs of the family. This is well known, well understood and well established.

As the National Family Health Survey-4 (2015-16) notes, women in the lowest wealth quintile have on average 1.6 more children than women in the highest wealth quintile, which translates into a total fertility rate of 3.2 children against 1.5 children passing from the richest to the poorest. Similarly, the number of children per woman decreases with the level of education of the woman. Women with no schooling have an average of 3.1 children, compared to 1.7 children for women with 12 or more years of schooling. This reveals the deep links between health, education and inequality, with those with little access to health and education being caught in a cycle of poverty, leading to more and more children, and the burden that state control over the number of children could impose on the weakest. As the latest Economic Survey points out, states with high population growth are also those with the lowest availability of hospital beds per capita.

In fact, demographers are careful not to use the word “population control” or “overpopulation”. The 2000 NPP uses the word “control” only three times: in reference to the National AIDS Control Organization; prevent and control communicable diseases and combat childhood diarrhoea. It is in this spirit that India has envisioned population to truly become a thriving resource; the lifeblood of a growing economy. Turning this into a problem that needs to be controlled is exactly the kind of phraseology, mindset and eventually action that will kill the nation. It will destroy all the good work that has been done and set the stage for a weaker and poorer health care delivery system – the exact opposite of what a program like Ayushman Bharat seeks to achieve. Today, no less than 23 states and union territories, including all states in the southern region, already have a below-replacement fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman. So support rather than control works.

Scars of the past

The damage caused by mishandling the problems of population growth is lasting. Let’s not forget that the scars of the emergency are still with us. Men were then part of family planning initiatives, but after the excesses of forced sterilizations, they continue to remain completely outside of family planning programs even today. The government now works mainly with women’s and children’s health programmes. Emergency-type errors are not what a new government with a solid electoral mandate would like to repeat. So it’s time to ask some of the prejudicial voices in government and the ruling party not to venture into territory they may not fully understand.

Jagdish Rattanani, journalist, is a faculty member of SPJIMR and co-author of the advocacy book, ‘Population: Questions That Should Be More Frequently Asked’ (Through The Billion Press)