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Advani favours legislation for population control

Home Minister L K Advani Saturday said he favoured a legislation providing incentives and disincentives to control the burgeoning population in the country, even while differing with the method of 'force' adopted in this direction by the Congress government in 1975 and 1976 during Emergency.

Advani, who was speaking at the unveiling of a '2001 Census' stamp, said while education of masses was important for creating awareness about population control, there may also be a need for a system of ''legal incentives and disincentives.''

The Home minister said though the current census work was being undertaken between February 9-28, the process had started soon after the Vajpayee government assumed power in 1998.

Paswan, who unveiled the stamp, said ''population explosion'' was acting as a hurdle in the country's development and added it was important to bring about stability in population growth.

''In countries like the UK and the US, the population level has virtually been the same for the last 20 years or so and as a result there is no need to build new schools or hospitals as in India,'' he said.

''In India the booming population growth marginalises all our achievements. If we set up a school for 500 students, we find there are already 5,000 students waiting to get admission. The same is the case with hospitals,'' he said.

PTI

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