CENTRE URGED TO
EVOLVE A FOCUSSED PROGRAMME FOR STABILISATION OF POPULATION
At a Conference of
State Population Commissions/Councils, sponsored by the National
Commission on Population here today, the Central Government was
called upon to evolve a focussed programme for the stabilisation
of population. It was felt that unless steps are taken urgently
in this regard all the development that we made so far would be
of no consequence. Addressing the conference, the Minister for
Human Resource Development and Science and Technology Dr. Murli
Manohar Joshi stressed the need for a synergy between the Ministries
of Health and Human Resource Development and other concerned departments
to centralise their attention to those states who are lagging
behind in stabilising the population.
Underlining the importance
of education and nutrition in this national task, Dr. Joshi said
wherever female literacy had gone up, population had come down
there. Also it was found that the states which had done very well
in the nutritional programme especially for the child and the
mother, the population was observed to be stabilising. What is
more important is the "political will" and a mission-mode approach
to achieve the goals of the National Population Policy. Stating
that the NGOs and the mahila mandals are doing very well in family
planning programmes, Dr. Joshi pointed out that the Anganwadi
workers can do a lot in this regard. He also spoke of incentives
and dis-incentives for population control and said if any state
wants to spread the awareness then population stabilisation could
be introduced in the syllabi. Health and education alone determines
the socio-economic strength of a nation, Dr. Joshi averred.
