MITHI: The recent census, which shows population in Thar is increasing at a faster rate than the rest of the country, gives the lie to the family planning department’s claims and proves people still need to be sensitised to the disadvantages of population growth and benefits of birth control methods.

Health and nutrition experts, rights activists and members of civil society working in Thar said while talking to Dawn on Wednesday that Sindh government should make concerted efforts to create awareness among Tharis to adopt modern birth control methods to help avert deaths of infants and expecting women.

Dr Aurangzeb Sand at Nagar­parkar taluka hospital outright rejected claims of the officials of the family planning department and accused them of concocting false reports about birth rate in Thar.

He argued if Tharis had adopted the methods the birth rate would not have shot to 4.08 per cent, more than double the birth rate of the country (2.1pc).

He claimed the number of men using contraceptives was below five per cent in Thar and said that even educated people were in the habit of adopting natural methods of birth control, which according to him, were riskier.

“It is very sad that everyone including media is accusing the health department of unabated deaths of infants but the bitter fact is that there is no concept of family planning in Thar,” he said.

“Tharparkar district has over the years hit headlines for unabated deaths of infants and expecting mothers but the fact that people are not ready to use contraceptives is always overlooked,” said Kirshan Sharma, a social activist.

He claimed that people living in over 2,500 registered villages of the desert district had neither been guided by local functionaries about contraceptives nor had they volunteered to adopt common birth control methods like condoms, injectable and painless reversible contraception methods including intrauterine device and birth control implant.

“No one in Thar, even those living in cities, bothers to adopt modern method of vasectomy. Some Hindus do use tubal ligation and oral pills but mostly men from Muslim communities still shy away from such methods,” he said.

Thari women were too shy to even discuss the issue with their husbands.

“It is need of the hour to focus on modern low-cost or even free-of-cost birth control methods,” said Karim Samejo, a local health activist.

He deplored that contraceptives given to local functionaries were never distributed among people in remote villages.

Mr Samejo claimed hardly five per cent people preferred to go for family planning and that too by unsafe methods like using condoms.

The Sindh government instead of investing huge funds in various “useless” methods should overhaul the “defunct” department of family planning, which had ceased to exist in most areas of the vast Thar region, he said.

Partab Shivani, an activist working on improvement of education in Thar, was of the opinion that education was the only way to curb all evils prevailing in the region.

“You cannot achieve goals and commitments like PF 2020 and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 until and unless you put your sincere efforts to ensure quality education,” he added.

A lady health worker said on condition of anonymity that only a few people living in towns like Mithi, Diplo, Islamkot used old or modern birth control methods but those living in rural areas still deemed it a sin. It was need of the hour to work on the serious issue in the region, she said.

No officer concerned of the health and family planning departments was available for comments.

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2017