Mizo church, youth body favour more children for natives to prevent population fading out

New Delhi, Jan 17: The Republic’s Total Fertility Rate was around 6.1 in 1961, which meant that on average, an Indian woman bore over six children during her lifetime. Alarmed by the population growth, in 1952, a family planning programme was launched.

A National Population Policy was formulated in 1976, but in circa 2017-- a Baptist church in remote Lungeli town of Mizoram-- has announced incentives to encourage couples to have more babies.
This was to "check" their dwindling numbers and save the Mizo population from fading out.
"We do not know, whether Government of India or anybody would consider our stance to have more children as violation of law. As an organisation and Mizo citizens we are concerned that we are a low-population group. So, the need of the hour is to have more children. Our tribe should not get lost or fade out," president of influential Young Mizo Association Vanlalruata said.
"What the church has done is worth emulating. We need to arrest the trend and if possible, to reverse it," he told UNI over phone from Aizawl.
Lunglei Bazar Veng Baptist Church recently announced that couple having four or more children would be given cash assistance of Rs 4,000 and Rs 5,000 (for the fifth child) and so on.
The YMA leader said even his association has, in the past, given recognition to couple who have more children.
Mizoram's population, according to 2011 census was 1,091,014, and has now risen to estimated 11,00,000 only.
Mizoram is the second least populous state in India and has a landscape of 21,087 square km.
Officials and social workers in Mizoram capital, Aizawl, affirm that the decadal population growth is also
low.
"As against 52 people per square km population density, Bihar has 1,000 of them. Where would we stand in future?” says a government employee.
Mizoram has about 88 per cent Christian population and out of around 11,000,00 citizens, nearly 2,17,000 are Baptists.
The population issue remains a vexed problem in the region, which has more than 200 linguistic and ethnic groups.
Mizoram, Nagaland and Meghalaya are India’s only Christian-majority states but the 'fight' against "outsiders" has been a dominant political issue for decades even in Assam and several other provinces.
According to northeast watchers, the population control policy as such has “failed" in the Northeast, especially among Naga and Mizo, as they firmly assert that a "mother’s womb should not become a graveyard".
The concern about dwindling numbers in the region should be understood more in a socio-political context rather than a religious one, according to observers. UNI