The Population Growth Rate In India Essays -- essays research papers

The Population Growth Rate in India For many years concern has been voiced over the seemingly unchecked rate of population growth in India, but the most recent indications are that some success is being achieved in slowing the rate of population growth. The progress which has been achieved to date is still only of a modest nature and should not serve as premature cause for complacency. Moreover, a slowing of the rate of population growth is not incompatible with a dangerous population increase in a country like India which has so huge a population base to begin with. Nevertheless, the most recent signs do offer some occasion for adopting a certain degree of cautious optimism in regard to the problem. One important factor which is responsible for viewing the future with more optimism than may previously have been the case has been the increase in the size of the middle class, a tendency which has been promoted by the current tendency to ease restrictions on entrepreneurship and private investment. It is a well-known fact that as persons become more prosperous and better educated they begin to undertake measures designed to eliminate the size of their families. (The obvious exception would be families like the Kennedys who adhere to religious strictures against artificial birth control, but the major Indian religions have traditionally lacked such strictures.) Ironically, the state of Kerala which had long had a Communist-led government had for many years represented a population planning model because of its implementation of programs fostering education and the emancipation of women. The success of such programs has indicated that even the poorer classes can be induced to think in terms of population control and family planning through education, but increased affluence correspondingly increases the pressure for the limitation of family size, for parents who enjoy good life want to pass it on to their children under circumstances where there will be enough to go around. In contrast, under conditions of severe impoverishment there is not only likely to be lack of knowledge of family planning or access to modes of birth control, but children themselves are likely to be viewed as an asset. Or, perhaps one might more accurately say with regard to India, sons are viewed as an asset. We will have more ... ...spread acceptance considerably more progress needs to be made in raising the standard of living of the Indian masses for "although the wealthier, better-educated urban families do curtail their fertility, the poor have not had the means or motivation to do so." "Most important, perhaps," writes John Cool, is the fact that thousands of years of Indian experience have shaped cultural values and social institutions, which encourage the survival of the family and the community through high fertility. Modernization is slowly changing this situation, but to insure success considerably more progress needs to be made. Bibliography Chandrasekhar, S. Abortion in a Crowded World: The problem of abortion with special reference to India (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1974). Franda, Marcus F. (ed.). Response to Population Growth in India: Changes in Social, Political, and Economic Behavior (New Yew: Praeger, 1975) Bahnisikha. The Indian Population Problem: A Household economics Approach (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1990) Mandelbaum, David G. Human Fertility in India: Social Components and Policy Perspectives (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974).