news details |
|
|
| Azad needs to counter reactionarries against family planning | | |
Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare,Ghulam Nabi Azad does not seem to be wrong when he advocated the need for stabilising country's population through voluntary efforts.He has ruled out achieving population control through bringing in legislation.Possibly he has not forgotten the Sanjay Gandhi era when a large number of men and women were forcibly dragged to the hospitals for sterilisation which resulted in a countrywide condemnation and uproar.Presumably Azad did not want people to recall that period and that could have been possible if the Government adopted a piece of legislation making it mandatory on the part of couples to adopt "Hum Do Hamarey Do" as their policy.No doubt times have changed and women,even in rural areas,are not prepared to become child producing machines and the menfolk have realised that a large family would be a burden on their resources and income there is still much to be done for ensring further cut in population
growth.Now men too encourage women to adopt family welfare measures.Besides this people have become health conscious after the health care facilities were extended to the rural areas by the Government.However,even with this rosy picture the population control measures in India are yet to produce the desired result.The growth rate has gone down slightly during the last 15 years but there is need for a major thrust on the population control programme even if it is to be made a voluntary exercise.Well you cannot check population growth by forcing men and women to go in for sterilisation and for that you have to move from door to door to seek consent from the couples.What then should be done to bring down the population growth rate further ?First of all the family welfare programme needs to be made more attractive than it is at present.You cannot woo women,keen to have more children or those eager to have a male baby even if she has to wait for that after
having given birth to six female babies, to accept family planning by giving her some money or some gifts.Such doles can have a temporary impact and that too in limited areas.Without adopting a legislation the centre and the state Governments could conceive some attractive packages for those who accept family planning programme.Well the working chairman of the Panthers Party,Harsh Dev Singh,had mooted a novel idea when he moved a constitutional amendment bill in the state Assembly providing for a ban on contesting the election for those who had more than two children.The bill was rejected as it failed to get the requisite support.This indicates that even the law makers were not in favour of restrictions on producing children. Had the Bill been adopted in the House it would have definitely motivated all those keen to contest the Assembly elections to plan their family before they could think of entering the Assembly. The Government can opt for many
ways for encouraging people to accept family planning.One such way could be sanctioning out of turn promotion for those who accept family planning or those who go in for sterilisation could be given a couple of incerements in advance.There can be no dearth of ideas for popularising family welfare programme which could be put into practice without inviting peoples' wrath.Those employees who have not more than two children could be considered for posting in areas of their choice.They could be considered for posting on key posts.If it is done family welfare programme can be a success.Azad is right when he said that the programme needs to have peoples' support on voluntary basis.People like Azad have to fight reactionaries who treat family welfare programme something against religion. When in mid-80's the Government laid emphasis on planned families the reactionaries like late Qazi Nissar,Mirwaiz of South Kashmir,announced that he would give a reward to
those who produced more than 10 chidlren.During his time neither anyone produced more than 10 babies nor the Qazi spent any money on the reward. His was a trick to throw a spanner in the family welfare programme.There are still many a Qazis in Jammu and Kashmir and people like Azad have to counter them by initiating juicy programmes for stabilising state's population.( |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
