Indira Gandhi and son Sanjay in a file photo from 1977
NEW DELHI: Over 1.07 crore people were sterilised during the National Emergency from 1975 to 1977, exceeding the “targets” set by the then Indira Gandhi govt by 60%, as per the findings of the Justice J C Shah Commission shared by the Union home ministry with Lok Sabha on Tuesday. The Justice Shah commission had inquired into the excesses, malpractices and misdeeds during the Emergency, including the use of force in implementation of the family planning programme. Its report was tabled in Parliament on Aug 31, 1978. Junior home minister Nityanand Rai, in a reply to a question, shared the Shah panel reported 548 complaints of sterilisation of unmarried people and 1,774 deaths linked to sterilisation.As per the Shah commission, the govt of India had set annual targets for the states and Union Territories for the sterilisation programme for 1975-76 and 1976-77. While the states exceeded the 1975-76 target of 24.8 lakh sterilisations by 5.6% (having sterilised 26.2 lakh people), the number of actual sterilisations in 1976-77 (81.3 lakh) exceeded the target(42.5 lakh) by a whopping 91%.Maharashtra saw the most sterilisations during the Emergency period (14.4 lakh), followed by Madhya Pradesh (11.1 lakh), Bengal (10.8 lakh) and UP (9.65 lakh). As per Shah commission report seen by TOI, the voluntary nature of family planning programme appeared to have undergone a sudden change during the Emergency period. A note sent by then Union health minister Karan Singh to Indira Gandhi on Oct 10, 1975, on the ‘crash programme to intensify family planning’, spoke of “introduction of some element of compulsion in the larger national interest”.”This can be done by enforcing a judicious and carefully selected mixture of incentives and disincentives. The present Emergency…(has) provided an appropriate atmosphere for tackling the problem,” Singh added.On Jan 22, 1976, PM Indira Gandhi spoke of “bringing down birth rate speedily” with “steps that may be described as drastic”.As per the Shah panel, the health ministry’s approach to family planning during the Emergency became focused on a single method: sterilisation. While the achievement of sterilisation targets was “107%” and 190% in 1975-76 and 1976-77, the performance with regard to other methods fell far short of the targets.Strangely, some states went out of their way to raise the 1976-77 targets beyond those set by the govt of India. For instance, UP revised the target to 15 lakh from 4 lakh, though it could achieve only 8.4 lakh sterilisations. Similarly, Maharashtra revised the target from 5.6 lakh to 12 lakh but ended up doing 8.3 lakh sterilisations. West Bengal revised the 3.9-lakh target set by Centre to 11 lakh, only to achieve 8.8 lakh sterilisations in 1976-77.
