Progeny power

The letter ‘Teeming millions’ by A.K. Sharma, exposes his ignorance of the first principles of human resource development. Yes, population should be controlled, but the poor who do not have any property, savings or any other form of economic security, find security in children, as they get more hands to work and earn — even if that means more mouths to feed, to begin with. To the poor, their offsprings are an insurance against life. Economically secure people adopt population control out of fear of dividing property, and to spend more on what are called lifestyle choices, expensive education, high quality health care etc. Their choices about the number of children aren't dictated by national needs. India is a welfare state and it is the republic’s constitutional responsibility to take care of the poor. I strongly feel that corruption, bureaucratic apathy, lack of political will and human resource utilisation are the main reasons why India has miserably failed to take care of its poor, and has in turn failed to control population. Recent reports reveal that of every rupee spent on welfare programme 78 paise goes to administrative and delivery cost and the remaining 22 paise is at the mercy of the corrupt. How much actually reaches the target population? I feel that, instead of humiliating the poor by serving them leftovers, our intellectuals, policy makers and administrators should strive to make them stakeholders in the nation’s economic development. Only then we will be able to advocate population control to the poor successfully.

... contd.