Three million sterilizations.

Our main interest was to find out in more detail about the speed-up in the sterilization program which had fallen several years ago from 1.8 million cases a year to 1.3 million. The figure for the year ending March 31 1972 was 2.15 million and the expectation for this year is 3 million. This increase is roughly 50% yearly for 2 years in the most effective method of all makes this the biggest family planning effort in the world. Its success is due to enlisting all the community forces - governmental and voluntary - in the campaigns. The 1st drives were in South India where vasectomy has long been popular; but the big new drive had been in Gujerat north of Bombay. There had been successes in Bihar 1 of the states hardest to organize.(Full text)