Reproductive Rights Initiative

Visit the Reproductive Rights initiative website at  www.reproductiverights.slic.org.in for complete information and regular updates about SLIC's work on Reproductive Rights. Information shared on this page represents only a fraction of the entire gamut of work done under the initiative.   India's National Family Welfare Programme has two core objectives:
  1. To address the needs of families, notably women and children, and
  2. To reduce population growth rates.
Despite the objectives listed above, the reality is that the programme in India has disproportionately focused on achieving population and demographic targets by increasing contraceptive prevalence, notably through female sterilization. Women's needs and the concept of reproductive rights have been generally overlooked, and women’s unequal access to resources, including health care and the stark gender disparities across India, continues to be reflected in the general devaluation of women. Despite the consensus on population reached at the International Conference on Population and Development (1994), there is alarming evidence of a resurgence of coercive population measures being introduced at the state level in an effort to discourage fertility. These measures are being levied against both men and women, for example through the use of social and economic incentives and disincentives, but have an especially devastating impact on women. The two-child norm policy for example is linked to gender-based violence and female infanticide. Against this backdrop, the RRI at SLIC uses the legal system to combat violations of reproductive rights, to ensure the implementation of reproductive rights schemes, and to demand accountability where implementation is left wanting.