The forced sterilization program under the Indian emergency: results in one settlement.
Source:
Human Organization. 1984 Spring; 43(1):49-61.
Abstract:
The issue that apparently was most responsible for turning Indira Gandhi out of office in 1977 -- the excesses of the sterilization program -- was forgotten in the new renewed mandate she received in 1980, raising the question of what impact the sterilizations did have, both demographically and politically. A SURVEY
of the refugee men at Hastinapur in Meerut District, Uttar Pradesh, revealded that 172 men had been sterilized, representing 38% of all men over 30, 10% of the entire male population, and as much as 53% of some age brackets. To determine what impact the sterilizations had, a control group from the same community was established by matching sterilized men with unsterilized men of the same age. The 2 groups combined accounted for 59% of the entire Bengali community at Hastinapur. As of 1970, the control group males had 32% fewer sons that did the group that consented to sterilization. In the 10 years during which the sterilization group has accepted this form of birth control, the figures on male births have reversed. The males who submitted to sterilization produced 18% fewer children that who did not. This differential may be even more significant considering that 57% of the sterilized men had the operation only 4 years before the data were collected. The control group's sons' wives are outproducing their counterparts in the sterilization group by 30% (0.97 children each in the sterilization group; 1.35 children each in the control group), suggesting that the households that have accepted sterilization have also accepted the value of birth control. The 172 sterilizations in the community, even though performed on men who already has fathered several children, did have a significant impact on population growth and control. Many of the men interviewed said there had been pressureon them to submit to sterilization, and some complained of vague problems resulting from the operation. Yet, the attitude was not strongly negative. This has to do in the main with the context of the various inducements offered for sterilization. It is not a political fact but a question whether issues themselves are really the major factors in electoral politics in North India. Clearly, issues emerge as easy reasons to give for voting in certain ways. So sterilization was a reason for voting the Congress Party out of office in 1977, just as the high cost and scarcity of basic COMMODITIES, as well as general lawlessness under the Janata government, were cited as the reasons for voting the Congree Party back in. The 1980 electons producedno unifying theme, so that once again local caste and class loyalites were the basisof voting decision.s
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