Evaluation of Family Planning Programme in India through Policy Perspective

This paper analyses the performacne of the family planning programme in India in the context of the goals and objectives of the National Population Policy 2000. The analysis is based on a Fertility Transition Index that has been developed for the purpose and that captures the two dimensions of fertility transtition - delayed child bearing and birth spacing and small family - articulated in the Policy. Using the data available through the 2001 population census and 2007-08 District Level Household and Facility Survey, the analysis reveals that there has been little change in the fertility transition index in India between 2001 and 2007. The analysis also reveals that gains in the dimension of small family norm have been upset by poor performance in the dimension of delayed child bearing and birth spacing. The paper stresses the need for focussing on addressing the unmet need of contraception for spacing to hasten the pace of fertility transition and proposes an alternative - outcome-based - system of monitoring the implementation of official family welfare programme, the mainstay of family planning efforts in the country.