New Delhi now wants families to stop at two, a
                 move which it hopes will stabilise the population
                 by 2045

                 By NIRMAL GHOSH
                 INDIA CORRESPONDENT

                 NEW DELHI -- India is introducing a "stop at two"
                 scheme to curb its burgeoning population.

                 After a gap of some 20 years, New Delhi has
                 approved incentives aimed at reducing population
                 growth to two children per woman by the year 2010.

                 This would have the effect of stabilising the country's
                 population by the year 2045, Health Minister N.T.
                 Shanmugam said.

                 He said the main philosophy behind the new policy
                 was that population control could be better achieved
                 by improving the lot, particularly of those below the
                 poverty line, through greater focus on a range of
                 issues from child survival and child health to illiteracy,
                 empowerment of women and increased participation
                 of men in planned parenthood.

                 The immediate objective was to address the needs for
                 contraception, health-care infrastructure, health
                 personnel and integrated service delivery, he said.

                 India is the world's second-most populous country
                 with close to one billion people. At current growth
                 rates, some 15.7 million people are added to the
                 population every year.

                 The country was the first in the developing world to
                 initiate state-sponsored family planning in 1952 -- and
                 New Delhi legalised abortion before it was made legal
                 in the US.

                 Though its efforts succeeded to some extent, the
                 population policy reached a dead-end because there
                 was little support in terms of women's education, and
                 the target-oriented system followed by government
                 social workers was flawed.

                 Literacy and education has the effect of empowering
                 women, which normally leads to them having fewer
                 children. The greatest effect of this is in the poorer
                 sections of the population, which also have the highest
                 birth rates.

                 While India's fertility rate fell from six births per
                 woman in the early 1950s to 3.5 and the birth rate
                 declined from 40 per 1,000 in the 1960s to 28 per
                 1,000 in 1995-96, the drop was not enough to have a
                 significant impact on population growth, partly
                 because of longer life expectancy and less infant
                 mortality.

                 Population growth has outstripped the government's
                 efforts to provide social infrastructure in some 45
                 years of a socialist, centrally-planned economy -- and
                 placed great stress on natural resources.

                 At the end of the 1970s, the population-control effort
                 came to a grinding halt when a draconian, coercive
                 sterilisation campaign promoted by then-Prime
                 Minister Indira Gandhi and her son Sanjay provoked
                 a severe backlash which cost Mrs Gandhi an election.

                 Since then, there has been paralysis on population
                 control -- until the new policy released on Tuesday.

                 Ahead of the release, Mr Shanmugam said: "Though
                 the government's programmes have prevented
                 approximately 200 million births up to 1998, the
                 population growth rate has not declined to the desired
                 extent so far."

                 He noted that nearly 12 per cent of the population
                 had already achieved net replacement levels in nine
                 states and Union territories -- areas which are
                 administered directly by New Delhi.

                 About 33.5 per cent of the population in 11 states
                 and Union territories were slowly reaching the goal of
                 net replacement levels, but nearly 55 per cent of the
                 population in 12 states and Union territories continued
                 to lag, he said.
 
 

                 CURBING BIRTHS: Incentives

                 INDIA'S population grows by 30 per minute, 1,815
                 per hour, 1.3 million per month and 15.7 million a
                 year -- close to the population of Australia.

                 Among the measures now being taken up to slow this
                 growth are:

                  Health-insurance schemes for couples below the
                 poverty line and with not more than two living children
                 who opt for sterilisation.

                  Cash incentives for antenatal checkups.

                  Strengthening facilities for safe abortions.

                  Enhancing primary education and literacy
                 programmes.

                  Encouraging later marriages.

                       Adapted from The Straits Times, 17 Feb 2000.