India's Fertility Regulation

Overview

Sterilization, by definition, is a medical procedure that leaves a person permanently unable to reproduce by severing a woman's fallopian tubes. It has long been a primary form of birth control implemented by government facilities in India to reduce population growth. For many parts of India especially in the rural areas, this method is seen as a cheaper and less-costly option as opposed to educating illiterate women in remote communities on how to use birth control pills and other contraceptives. As a result, India has one of the highest rates of female sterilization in the world since many Indian women are forced into sterilization camps by health workers. Female sterilization camps in India often lack quality medical infrastructure to conduct sterilization procedures in a safe environment, which leads to tragic sterilization death incidents. While public health system in India are improving over the years, there is so much more to be done by the government of India and its community.

Issues and Concerns

Fundamentally, India's sterilization initiatives are predominantly pushed upon the relatively marginalized communities. The sterilization procedure, especially in rural parts of India, is frequently performed in extremely unsafe and disturbing conditions. In many cases, the environment in which the operation takes place has limited access to running water and clean medical equipments. Medial instruments are frequently overused and not sanitized properly before being used on the next patient and even though there are health and safety recommendations within government guidelines, they are rarely followed, as evident by the post surgical conditions of those who experienced the procedure, such as infection and blood loss due to unclean surgical equipment. , In addition, multiple women are operated on at once without being medically examined nor kept for medical observation post surgery. In Chhattisgarh, the daily team target is around 40 sterilizations, but operations held on the weekends exceed far beyond that number. In one instance, 83 women were operated on by one surgeon within the span of six hours, which means it only took an average of five minutes per procedure. In the aftermath, over three-quarters of those women were treated for septic shock.

As demonstrated, the negligence and carelessness towards the safety of female patients in India's mass sterilization camps reflect a larger problem of inadequate public health system for the majority of India's population.

Another issue with regards to India's sterilization programs is incentives. The majority of women who underwent such procedure were offered paid incentives such as sums of money and or gifts. In poverty-stricken communities such as Chhattisgarh, one of India's poorest states, women would risk their lives for 1,400 rupees ($27 CAD), which is close to two weeks wage for a manual labourer, for having the operation. While it may not seem a lot to many, that sum of money is a substantial amount for them. While some incentives are generous, it is dangerous and even to an extent, a form of coercion to entice people into going through sterilization. Between 2009 to 2012, the government of India paid compensation to the families of the 568 women who died as a result of the procedure.

Feminism

From a feminist's perspective, it is transparent that the overarching problem with India's mass sterilization phenomenon is gender imbalance. Instead of educating women about their reproductive rights and alternatives, they are being coerced into dangerous operations without realizing the risks of it. Without education, women can only blindly trust the government when it comes to free birth control, especially for those who are poor and illiterate. The reality of the situation in many parts of India today is that women are still being pressured to undergo dangerous birth control methods without truly understanding the harm and dangers of it due to lack of education and access to public health information. All said, the first step to end this tragedy is to educate women about their rights. Women need to understand that they are entitled safe choices to their reproductive health, and equal access to public health information from health care providers. Moreover, the government needs to take effective measures to ensure women receive proper medical care and safe sterilization procedure that would not put their lives at risk. There will also be a need for stricter monitoring on health facilities and greater efforts in enforcing health guidelines imposed by the government.