Politics
Friday February 24, 2006
“Sterilization Quota” Ordered by Indian Judge
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By Terry Vanderheyden
ALLAHABAD, India, February 24, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – An Indian Judge has ordered that public servants, teachers, and village leaders fulfill a “sterilization quota” or face sanctions that can include firing, suspensions, or transfers.
Judge Amrit Abhijat has ordered Medical and Health Department officials in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh to each bring in 10 individuals for sterilization. According to an AsiaNews agency report, Judge Abhijat claimed that population explosion is the root of all evil.
Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India (CBCI) Secretary General, Mgr Stanislaus Fernandes, said that the Catholic Church “strongly condemns this sterilisation plan which is contrary to God’s laws and morality, and [which] must be stopped without delay for the good of the nation.” Judge Abhijat’s order is “unacceptable and contrary to divine laws,” he added.
Teachers were also incensed by the demand. Primary school teacher Ravi Prasad Chaurasia said, “Are we supposed to teach students or ask them to bring their parents to medical camps for sterilisation? It is shameful but who is going to listen to us?”
“The Medical and Health Department failed to persuade even a single woman but I alone led at least 90 women to the local centre for sterilisation,” boasted Ramashanker Pandey, head of Pathartaal village. “But all of them could not be operated because of a lack of doctors.”
Spokesman and director of the CBCI’s Media and Communications Department, Fr Babu Joseph, emphasized that “The Church cannot accept a barbarous practice like sterilization. Above all the Church wants to protect human dignity and honour,” he added. “Human being should be allowed to make their own decisions in every field that pertains to them, including the family.”
“This sentence is the by-product of the madness that comes when people want to turn social goals in targets to meet,” commented All India Catholic Union President John Dayal. “In any democracy, family planning ought to be voluntary. Any limits are necessarily self-imposed. Population growth is a function of education, economic prosperity and social responsibility, not the other way around. In the hands of a dictatorship, family planning becomes a tool that threatens human and civil rights, above all the rights of the poor.”
See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
500,000 Girls Aborted Per Year in India new Study Finds
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/jan/06010909.html
India’s Coercive 2-Child Policy Resulting In Female Abortions
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/aug/02081602.html
India Announces Coercive Population Control
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2000/feb/00021805.html
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