Sounds harsh…very harsh indeed. But it’s a fact, a blot which no detergent making companies can claim to erase. It can be, only if we take the case out in streets like the famous ‘Dhobi-ghaats’ in Mumbai. It has to be a current matter on everyone’s lips. Then, perhaps we can come up with some solution. And when I talk of a solution, don’t treat me like one with godly powers as the only way we can up with a solution in this case is by elimination substitution kind of method. There’s no direct formula. We have to derive it in the process of solution-making as many a time, instead of dealing with the superlatives, we have to deal with good and better, bad and worse!
With India’s population of 1.21 billion, we represent almost 17% of world’s population at a mere 2.4% of the world's land area. Population of UP almost equals to that of Brazil!
The main culprit as we all know is poverty, which is the consequence of illiteracy and corruption. And how does poverty inflect such injury on our society? Well, poor families who are not part of the main economy consider their family members as potential economic assets. Each family member contributes something to their household incomes.Wait, lets take a pause and apply reverse gear.
There are many poor families who don’t wish to have an army of offspring. They have it only due to illiteracy, society norms, religion and less focus on these issues by our government (In fact Iran is the only country where mandatory contraceptive courses are required for both males and females before a marriage license can be obtained!).
They are either out of reach of contraceptives or are hesitant in using them. So what happens is that in order to increase the household income, they make each member responsible to feed themselves. And so arise the issues like child-labor, high school drop-out rate etc. But this is the story of poor families without enough opportunities even to make ends meet.
What about us? The better educated people we claim to be, what are we doing to help curb the problem of population. The growth rate of population in rural and urban areas in last decade was 12.18% and 31.80% respectively. The stark difference is due to migration and Us. We better-offs still aspire to cultivate at least two children.
Social problems have attracted our attention only when it satisfies our ego or when it entertains us. We delve into so called problems of the need of daughters of our and other families to get married soon and to get married in the same caste and sub-caste and sub-sub-caste. And if there is any out-of-caste marriage, then how to deal with ‘The Problem’ becomes the problem. But population growth is not an issue. What becomes the issue instead is couples cosying up in public parks. And then sprouts periodically, the ludicrous ‘Operation Majnu’, where a police woman perhaps driven by schadenfreude, hounds a couple in a park and makes the men do sit-ups causing immense chagrin to the couple and grabbing the grinning media reporters’ attention which again shoots the TRPs of the concerned channel viewed by the ‘Concerned Us’.
What is the problem? I think the problem is that even our middle class and the high class ends don’t know what the real problem is. They still motivate young people of their and others' families, to produce offspring as soon as possible and two children is a must! Adoption and abortion are far-fetched terms. ‘Condoms’ is a word that people still shy of uttering in public (even in their rooms!). But they are not shy of having three children. They are shy of talking about sex. They are not shy of doing it but despise the topic of the outcomes of their ‘deeds’!!
They are shy of displaying even hints of basic sexual affection like kissing and hugging in public but they don’t think once before relieving their bladder in public places or performing honor killing or having loud personal conversations in public places. The otherwise shy aunts are not shy of showing off their huge unclothed potbellies while draped in ‘sarees’(Indian traditional wear). But they are definitely against the western outfits worn by females.
We are hypocrites. The whole mankind is hypocrite. But where do we draw the line? We say, “We’re proud to be Indians”. But sadly we no more identify the ‘Indianness’ or even fail to define the same. Nevertheless we’re proud of being a country of entrepreneurs. We’ve established the factories that produce the beloved children, 'Our Future’ !
You also may like to watch this documentary about kartavya, an NGO..
image source: http://www.overpopulation.org/rabbit-cartoon.html, http://filipspagnoli.wordpress.com/2009/07/29/some-more-population-growth-nonsense-from-india/
