Development and Population Control: Civil Services Mentor Magazine January 2013

DEVELOPMENT, according to many analysts, is “the best contraceptive”. But if we look at India, there seems to be some doubt about the statement’s truth. In India, planned development and family planning have been going on for over four decades now. But our population problem has only become more disturbing over the time. The fruits of development are seen on the food front where production has gone up three and a half times since 1951. Life expectancy has increased, so has the gross domestic product. We are among the first 15 countries in industrial production. Schools have proliferated. However, population growth has not slowed down much. The increase in population, in fact, dilutes every improvement in India’s national development.

The gap between GDP and per capita income indicates the adverse effect of a large population on standard of living. Another aspect of development in India is the skewed distribution of the GDP, which has denied any effective rise in the living standards of most Indians. Nearly 30 per cent of the people still live below the poverty line and many more just hover over the border. line. The benefits of development have been mostly cornered by a small per-centage of people, with only some small portions ‘trickling’ down to the majority. The existing standard of living is just about maintained so that there is a low death rate but no appreciably high reduction in the birth rate.