Readings in Indian Sociology by Madhu Nagla

Author:Madhu Nagla
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sage Publications India Pvt, Ltd -- eBooks

9

Caste Variations in Reproductive Health Status of Women: A Study of Three Eastern States

Papia Raj and Aditya Raj

Introduction

In India, caste plays a major role in the life of her people, influencing their socioeconomic activities, and in turn regulating their health status. S.N.M. Kopparty (1991) shows the variation in the utilisation of health resources among different caste groups and its impact on their health status. Similarly, Thomas Matthai (1996) states that, because of differential literacy rate and economic status between the scheduled castes and non-scheduled castes, there is also a difference in their health status. In caste-based Indian society, women of the lower castes are the worst hit, as they suffer from double discrimination: First, in the patriarchal society women are discriminated against men, as they have to bear the burden of household work demanding much time and energy without adequate compensatory diet. And second, a lower-caste woman, owing to her poor socioeconomic status, also experiences social deprivation. Both these factors are detrimental to the health status of women, especially their reproductive health.

Given that caste is important in the life of an individual, in this paper we examine the caste variations in the reproductive health of women. There are as yet no studies on the reproductive health status among different caste groups. The National Family Health Survey (NFHS)-1 (1992–93) gives us an opportunity to conduct such a study, as it has compiled data on caste (International Institute of Population Sciences 1994). Though a second round of NFHS also collected similar data in 1997–98 (International Institute of Population Sciences 2000), we have not considered that data in this study for two reasons: First, when the NFHS-2 was conducted, the state of Bihar had been divided into Bihar and Jharkhand. And second, since the NFHS is a sample survey, and not a longitudinal survey, comparing the two sets of data would not throw much light on the actual situation.

Reproductive Health in India

Women and child health received a major impetus after the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo (1994), which recommended that the participant countries should implement unified programmes for Reproductive and Child Health (RCH), as it was considered essential to human welfare and development. In the ICPD, reproductive health was defined as the state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity, in all matters relating to the reproductive system and to its functions and processes (ICPD Programme of Action, paragraph 7.2). India, being a signatory to the ICPD, strongly supports the Programme of Action and, since the 1990s, the Government of India has introduced the RCH Approach. This approach includes the ability (of couples) to reproduce and regulate their fertility. Women can go through pregnancy and childbirth safely, the outcome of pregnancy is successful as for maternal and infant survival and well-being, and couples can have sexual relations free of fear of pregnancy and of contracting diseases.

Indian women, by and large, have a poor reproductive health status, as is evident from the NFHS data.

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